


Pet Names

by Vera (Vera_DragonMuse)



Series: By any other name [2]
Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-13
Updated: 2016-05-24
Packaged: 2018-05-20 06:00:40
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 38,728
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5994103
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vera_DragonMuse/pseuds/Vera
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Being a collection of filled in moments, other POVs and various ephemera in this verse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Wedding

“I’ve done it once already,” Harrison handed Cisco a folder. “It was a nightmare. Whatever you want is fine.” 

“Nightmare?” Cisco took it from him. 

“She was five months pregnant and her parents insisted. She was miserable, so I was miserable. There were three hundred guests and the dullest wedding band imaginable. We walked out on our own reception about an hour in and no one noticed.”

“Ouch.” 

“Exactly.” 

“So no parents?” Cisco bit his lip. 

“If you want yours there, you can have them. I don’t think we need the extra anxiety of the dead attending, so I’d leave my side out.” 

“Zombie wedding could be fun,” a smile scrounged up from somewhere, Cisco wandered off. 

About a week later, both of them wrist deep in a mix of plaster for a model Harrison was developing, Cisco announced, 

“They’re not coming.” 

“Were they invited?” Harrison added more powder to the mixture. 

“There was a conversation,” Cisco said carefully. 

“I see.” 

“Jesse, Dante and Cassie. That’s all we need, right?” 

“We could shanghai two people off the street to act as witness if you want to get particular, but yes, I imagine that that would be the basics of it.” 

“It’s a little depressing, but I think they’re the only ones that matter,” pulling his hands from the muck, Cisco watched the globs of half-set plaster drip into the container. “Not St. Margaret’s or anything, obviously.” 

“Why obviously?” 

“Have you ever seen me even close to a church?” Cisco snorted. “God and I are not on speaking terms. I always assumed that you...” 

Harrison waited him out. 

“Atheist?” Cisco said, running out of steam. “How do I not know this?” 

“We never talked about it. We’ll still be finding things out about each other for a long time for now,” he reached for a towel and held it open. Cisco placed his hands it for Harrison to wipe clean. “I went as a child, you too?” 

“Hmhm. Boring.” 

“Agreed. I would listen to the sermons though. We had a good deacon. Very good speaker,” Harrison could still hear the even tone, low and convincing, “after my mother died, we kept going. An empty ritual, but my father was susceptible to inertia. I was starting to become aware that I was...not quite in the mean of human experience.” 

“Super smart, smoking hot?” Cisco teased and Harrison winked at him. For a moment, he concentrated on cleaning between Cisco’s fingers. 

“I asked the deacon if God would forgive someone who did the right things, but didn’t feel them in their heart.” 

“What he say?” 

“He didn’t understand what I meant. He listened though and after that, he always said hello to me after a service,” dropping the towel behind him, Harrison slid his hands around Cisco’s, finding and fidgeting with the engagement ring. “I don’t worry much about how everything got made or why we’re here. I think that an intelligent creator would be more of a burden than a relief. I like churches when they’re empty. They’re restful.” 

“I used to worry about it all the time,” Cisco rubbed the pad of his thumb over Harrison’s knuckles. “Death worried me. I had reoccurring nightmares about the devil when I was seven.” 

“When did it stop? Worrying about death.” 

Cisco surveyed him from under his lashes, then sighed, 

“When I started seeing my visions. I could see myself so far ahead...not clearly, you know. But grey hair and wrinkles, the whole thing. I knew I’d be okay for a long time. That helped,” Cisco smiled, a small private thing. 

“So where does that leave you with the Almighty?” Harrison prodded. 

“Confused, bored,” Cisco shrugged. “Definitely don’t want them involved in my day to day, let alone my wedding.” 

“So we’re looking for a Justice of the Peace.” 

“Guess so.” 

“How do you feel about Central City Townhall?” 

“Don’t know anything about it.” 

“There’s a judge that oversaw a lawsuit or two. She’s married to one of the girl’s in medical.” 

“Francine?” Cisco nodded. “Yeah, I’ve seen the picture on her desk. Think she’d do it?” 

“Why not? And it wouldn’t be an utter stranger.” 

The judge’s name was Janice and she agreed to a Friday afternoon in a month’s time. It suited them both to move forward once their minds were set to it. Jesse said nothing, her mouth a wavering line when he told her. 

“You don’t have to come,” he said though it broke his heart to do it. “I know that it can’t be the easiest thing to witness.” 

“Dad!” She actually hit him, an open hand on his chest that thudded dully. “What do you take me for?” 

“A girl who lost her mother and has to watch as her father fills the position of his partner?” 

“Cisco isn’t Mom,” her expression softened. “I can’t...it’ll be weird because it will be, but if I weren’t there I would never forgive myself. He made you...you again. Made me more myself. I would never do that to him.” 

Harrison hugged her, incapable of refraining. They clung to each other as they had many years ago when they’d both been dressed in black. 

“I don’t know how you came from me,” he told her, stroking her hair. “But I am fantastically glad every day that you did. I’m so proud of you.”

“Proud of you too, Daddy.” 

When Cisco mentioned he was thinking of just wearing the suit Harrison had bought him for the night Gotham, it was Jesse who made a sound of disgust and dragged him out for the day. 

“Did she buy you a nice dress?” Harrison teased when Cisco came home shellshocked. 

“You joke, but that was one of the options.” 

“And?”

“Don’t sound so interested,” Cisco laughed. “If you want me in a dress, it ain’t gonna be white.” 

“Is that so?” 

“Spoiler alert: if I had any virginity left when I met you, you’ve made sure it was long gone.” 

“Don’t challenge me. I’m sure I can find something.” 

“Awesome,” the kiss was firm, inquisitive, “anyway, Jesse says you can’t see it before the wedding.” 

“Superstitions,” Harrison scoffed. 

“Actually, she made a very uncomfortable comment about you having seen me every which way and that some surprise should be left the wedding night,” his nose wrinkled. 

“Lovely.” 

Dante and Cassie were easier sells. Dante made a few jokes about honest women and Cassie was just excited. She and Jesse decided on a pleasant shade of pink that managed to flatter both their vastly differnt skin tones and bullied Dante into wearing a matching tie. Harrison vetod all flower attempts, but a rose showed up on his jacket pocket on the day anyway. He didn’t have the heart to discard it. 

While the younger people got ready, he went for a walk in the woods. He was already wearing his suit, so he didn’t linger long. He just stood there, one hand on a tree with an ugly scar across the trunk. 

“I like to think you’re still out there somehow,” he told the green leaves and lonely birds. “and that you’re not too disappointed in what I’ve done with Jesse. With the company. I know that you would’ve like Cisco. I think you would approve.” 

The woods had nothing to offer him back. It never had. Theresa’s body was buried several states away. All of her things that he still had were inside the house. He had never felt her there or at her graveside. Only the faintest flicker when he saw Jesse make a certain gesture or pronounce a word with an accent she’d never really had. Theresa was dead and her opinion couldn’t matter anymore. 

Yet, he yearned to talk to her today more than any other day. He wanted her calm advice and her practical briskness. It was absurd and contradictory, but that was life. 

They traveled separately despite Harrison’s protests at the absurdity. Jesse sat in the passenger seat, a jarring change from the norm. She looked luminous in the summer’s afternoon brightness, a knot of ethernet cords wound round a single white lilac in her lap. It’s perfume filled the car. 

The rest of the world went about its regular business. They parked in the garage across from the massive marble edifice of the town hall and crossed the road with people in suits walking briskly to their destinations, sweat beading on their brows. 

“Hall 14b, sir,” a girl at information chirped. Then said shyly, “your fiancee looks nice.” 

“Thank you,” he squashed the urge to tip her into forgetting she ever saw them. They’d agreed to let the word spread naturally, but he suddenly and fiercely wanted privacy. A closed room with no unwanted eyes. 

14B’s door was ajar and Jesse insisted on going in first. 

“Just take a few deep breaths,” she fussed over his suit jacket, buttoned it and stood back. “Count to ten, then come in.” 

“This is-” 

“Special circumstances,” she said firmly. “Ritual, Daddy. Ritual.” 

So he took a few deep breaths and counted. At ten, he turned the corner and walked into the room. It was as plain as he could’ve hoped, wood paneling at every angle and not a stitch of white fabric in sight. There was Cisco though. Standing at the front of the room, dressed in a lovely tailored bit of work, the details of which Harrison forgot immediately. He looked just like himself. A small window danced light down into the room, catching on his dark hair. 

“Hi,” Cisco smiled at him, perfectly wide and utterly happy in a way generally reserved for the morning after. He held out a hand and Harrison was helpless to do anything, but take it. 

The ceremony was brief, the judge calm and not unpleasantly warm in her remarks. Harrison dutifully repeated vows that he’d agreed on when Cisco emailed them to him a week before. They were standard, love and honor and treat with respect, all things that he thought he managed well enough. It was something to hear Cisco repeat them though, his eyes bright with emotion. 

“This is your partner,” the judge intoned. “This is your husband. By the power vested in me by the state, I pronounce you married in the eyes of the law. Be kind to each other.” 

Harrison cupped Cisco’s cheek, memorizing his expression, then kissed him soundly. A light flashed and when he pulled away, he found Cassie holding an enormous camera and Jesse with her hands pressed tightly together and tears running down her cheeks. 

“Congratulations,” she sniffed and hugged them both at the same time, her small arms managing the embrace masterfully. “You still don’t get to be my step-dad.” 

“You ruin all my fun,” Cisco said, his voice thick. 

There was cake in the hallway, a small messy thing that Dante proudly held aloft. 

“It took a few tries,” Cassie laughed. “But he’s getting good.” 

They cut it together and then Cisco ate the entire slice after spotting an almond. 

“Here,” he took the Tesla’s keys out of his pocket and handed them to Jesse. “The taxi should be waiting.” 

“He still doesn’t know?” 

“He’s been busy,” Harrison shrugged, pleased that the secret had held. “You call me if you need me, understood?” 

“I’m not alone, Dad,” she glanced over at Dante, who was laughing as Cisco read him the riot act about allergens. “It’ll be okay.” 

“I can still cancel-” 

“No,” she rolled her eyes at him. “Please do not subject me to your honeymoon. I’m not convinced you’re going far enough.” 

Bundled into the back of the taxi, Cisco was still talking to Dante out the window, too preoccupied to notice the driver folding suitcases into the trunk or Harrison pulling an envelope out of his jacket pocket. 

“We’re married,” Cisco whirled around as the car pulled away. 

“I noticed,” Harrison put his hand on Cisco’s knee. “Dr. Wells.” 

“Oooh. Say it again.” 

“Dr. Cisco Wells,” he repeated slowly. “here’s the first official piece of paper with your name on it.” 

Cisco took the envelope with a puzzled look and then opened it. 

“Plane tickets?” he studied them and his eyes went wide. “You hate the beach.” 

“I hate burning and most tropical drinks,” Harrison corrected. “I think I can manage to enjoy my new husband in a swimsuit for a week on a private stretch of sand.” 

“I don’t-” 

“I packed for you.” 

“I thought we were going to Zurich next month. We agreed and everything,” Cisco frowned. 

“And we still will. But I noticed a certain...disappointment.” 

“No! I’m looking forward to it. I’ve never been to Europe and it’s one of your favorite places.” 

“I have a feeling that Martinique is about to become one of my favorite places,” he moved his hand fractionally up Cisco’s thigh until Cisco gasped. “With a bullet.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The first part of the origins of Team Penumbra. Cassie, Dante and Jesse from Cassie's perspective.

Cassie dyed her hair blue. It’d grown out some, an inch of spiky black that succumbs to wiles of her uneven bleaching and soaked in the deep vibrancy of Blue Velvet with a thirst. She studied herself in the mirror and was pleased with the results. It wasn’t really her color anymore than the mossy green had been, but not everything was about being presentable. 

Sometimes you just had to make a point. 

“I like it,” Dante was leaning in the doorway, his signs a fluid background to her efforts. She’d done a front streak of his hair and it made him look puckish. 

“Good, me too,” she blotted away the last of the vaseline around her forehead and tossed her towel into her hamper. 

Her apartment was a cramped mess of a place, the aesthetic having long since slid from charming bohemian to piles of dirty clothes and half-started projects. It had only gotten worse since Dante had started coming over on the regular. He had a pathological hatred of tidying that Cassie chalked up to Mrs. Ramon’s stress cleaning. 

They had lived in this same building since Cassie was six and Dante was five. The first time Cassie met them, Dante had gotten a hold of a firecracker from somewhere and nearly blinded her when he set it off in their hallway. In the blinking aftermath, she had thought he was an angel, haloed in white smoke. 

“Boom!” Cisco squealed behind his brother. 

Cisco had been a toddler, refusing pants like they might scald him and following after his brother with a finger in his mouth. Before Dante and Cisco, the building hadn’t had any other children even close to her age. It was a match made in Heaven. 

Chasing each other around the hallways, playing out elaborate imaginary worlds, her small space had expanded to include them. Until Dante started fifth grade and was suddenly too good to hang out with the weirdo on the fifth floor, who never had clean clothes and ate cheese sandwiches for lunch. Cisco started hanging around more, folding himself small on her floor while she told him elaborate stories with her two My Little Ponies. 

Then the accident and they were both gone. First at the hospital and then under lock and key. Then there really was only Cisco, Dante sealed away and refusing to even peek around the door when she knocked and asked for them. 

“He’s sick,” Cisco explained and the air around him smelled wrong. 

She avoided them both after that. It wasn’t hard. CPS finally came for her two weeks later and she started her tour of foster families where she was praised for her behavior, but never kept on. Too old to be cute, too young to be useful. 

When her mother died, Cassie moved back in with her father. He was a useless parent, but not dangerous. She could do her own laundry now anyway. Sixteen, filled with the vinegar of rejection, she ran into Cisco in the hallway. Insults were ready at the back of her throat, acid in her belly for everyone who’d left her. He looked terrible, a rash of acne on one side of his face and t-shirt so bright that hit hurt to look at. 

“Hi!” He smiled at her, eyes crinkling at the corners. “Welcome back. Here.” 

He handed her a bag of Twizzlers. She took them out of self-defense. 

“What are these for?” 

“House warming present,” his hair was an odd length as if he’d attempted a skater’s cut on his own. In the dark. “I was going to make something, but Mama won’t let me near the oven after the last time.” 

“What happened the last time?” she asked despite herself.   
“I made a critical error in my calculations and caused a tiny explosion. Super small! Barely anyone noticed!” he was scowling at the memory and it was...horrifying and endearing. 

“Thanks. For the Twizzlers.” 

“You’re welcome. I gotta go, but if you wanted to stop by I think Dante would like to see you.” 

“Yeah, right,” she rolled her eyes. “Mr. Julliard doesn’t want garbage like me sullying his rep.” 

Cisco took a step backward, shook his head, sending his floppy hair outward. 

“Yeah. Sure, whatever.” and was gone down the hall before she could follow up on that. 

Maybe it was boredom, maybe it was curiosity and just maybe it was the memory of a boy with dancing brown eyes that always gave himself away during hide and seek by humming notes to himself. 

Cassie baked cookies from a package and brought them downstairs. Mr. Ramon answered the door. 

“I wanted to say hi to Dante,” she explained, holding the plate out like an offering. “It’s been a couple of years.” 

He hesitated, so she tried on her best ‘adopt me, please’ smile. 

“Is that Cassie?” Cisco popped his head out in the hallway. “Hi, Cassie!” 

“Hi, Cisco,” she suppressed a laugh. Mr. Ramon heaved a sigh and stood aside. 

“You keep an eye on your brother, papito,” he lumbered away back towards the game that blared on the television. “Don’t let him get too excited.” 

“Okay,” Cisco gestured her further inside and the door closed with a click behind her. 

Dante’s room was where she remembered it, but the door wasn’t covered in marker drawings and his third grade spelling bee participant certificate anymore. The leftover tackiness of the tape had stayed behind, leaving scars on the otherwise emptied canvas. Cisco knocked. 

“Visitor, jerkface,” Cisco sing-songed. 

The door opened very slowly. A soft light spilled outwards, sending Dante’s shadow cascading over Cisco’s face. 

“Remember me?” 

Dante stared at her. He’d gotten tall, his shoulders broad, arms almost comically gawky like a lot of the boys and school. His face was the same though, except for the scar on his forehead and the hunted look in his eyes. He nodded once slowly. 

“Cool. I moved back in.” 

Dante nodded again, eyes slipping over to Cisco. 

“He doesn’t talk,” Cisco explained. “He understands though. Mostly. Want a cookie, dude?” 

Dante let the door open wider, exposing a relentlessly pristine room. Everything in it’s place except for electric keyboard standing at an angle away from the wall. There chaos reigned, sheet music falling at every angle intermingled with half-eaten plate of toast and several cups of water at varying degrees of fullness. 

She offered the plate to him and he took a single cookie, turning his back to them and walking back to his keyboard. He sat down behind it, took a bite of the cookie and then set it next to the toast. He looked her up and down once, slowly and it prickled over her skin. Not entirely badly either. 

Then he put his fingers to the keys. It had been a long time since she’d listened to Mariah Carey. She had been a favorite when they were small, playing on ragged tapes in her player and sung off key whenever she was alone in the dark. The song brought her back and she sat down on the floor, leaning against the bed. 

She wasn’t sure when Cisco left. The song faded and out and ran into another, something classical this time. Something he would’ve played to impress a cluster of aunts when they were small. Then there was another and another. She closed her eyes and listened. 

School was miserable, home was cold and the world wasn’t ready to let her grow up. So she hid in Dante’s bedroom in the afternoons, bringing in the outside to him. Reluctantly, he would leave his keyboard and sit beside her while she did homework until he could work out the equations in his soft questioning pencil marks beside her. 

It never occurred to her that he couldn’t return her conversation. He spoke with his body and the tick of wobbling letters when he had something more complicated to communicate. When ASL was offered for a semester, she took it instead of coasting through with Spanish. 

The day they went to jail, she’d learned the sign for ‘sexy’. She’s been planning on showing it to Dante for a laugh. Instead, she spent the afternoon listening to Mrs. Ramon weep and beg for her boys on the phone. 

“They’re sending Dante home,” she choked in the wee hours. “Will you come and get him with me?” 

Shocked to be asked, Cassie only nodded. Mrs. Ramon held her hand with painful tightness when they waited in the stale coffee air of the station. Dante emerged still speckled in blood. He walked straight passed his mother and clung to Cassie like she was a lifeline. The smell of rot was repellent, but she hugged him back with unparalleled force. 

It was different after that. Dante had chosen her. Dante wanted her comfort, her coarse version of affection. He came to her apartment sometimes instead of waiting for her to show. Cisco showed up occasionally with Dante’s things in his hands. 

“He likes this pillow,” he’d explain. Or “I think he meant to bring this to show to you.” 

She didn’t understand what he was doing until it was done. Cisco disappeared into the cold ivory arms of academia and he left Dante in her care, her room morphing slowly in theirs. She graduated high school late, still struggling to catch up on missing time. There was a part-time job at a certain shop which she certainly didn’t take just so she could use the employee discount to bring Dante new books of sheet music to peruse. 

Maybe people thought she was serving him. Maybe they thought she was a too nice girl helping out the sweet disabled boy. They didn’t see Dante doing her laundry or learning how to cut her hair. They didn’t know that he installed a second lock on her door when she had a nightmare about her mother coming back from the dead. No one understood his signs enough, to know how he told her a thousand ways that she was special and important. 

There was no one to witness how he had summoned up tremendous courage to walk her to her first day at her first full time gig and how he waited on a bench outside until she was done at five o’clock to walk her back. Or how he made her dinner that night. No one knew that he texted her fiendishly during the day when he knew she’d be bored, so that she wouldn’t give up and quit out of sheer frustration. When her father died, no one saw Dante wipe the blood off her fist after she’d punched a wall or how he’d plastered over the hole the next day while she dealt with funeral arrangements. 

“Pretty girl like you shouldn’t have to do hard labor,” Dante had joked and she had laughed until she sobbed and he held her, rocking them both on the cold floor that now belonged to her. 

No one knew that they’d been having sex since that first day. That Dante had played and played then come to squat by her side and she’d kissed him because that’s what she had wanted to do. He wasn’t her first, but he was the first one that looked her in the eye afterwards and that mattered more. 

She never doubted he could talk because he’d held her hands and kissed her palms, right where she’d most wanted. He’d held out her pants and let her steady herself on his shoulders while she climbed back into them. 

When he decided to start playing in public again, she would seal a kiss over each finger before they left the apartment. He mostly lived with her now, nominally appearing in his parents’ apartment for breakfast out of some filial promise. 

“Cassie, this is Dr. Wells,” Cisco stood backstage in the shadows, so much more than he had been with his packet of Twizzlers. Yet his expression was just the same. 

“Your doctor,” she took one of Harrison’s hands in both of hers, taking measure of the rough skin and tough bone beneath. She could feel his eyes boring into her, taking her measure. She lifted her chin to greet it. 

When her phone buzzed early the next morning, she’d had to roll over Dante to get to it. He grumbled and groped her ass with lazy interest. She read it with a frown. Wells’ daughter had only been a blur in the audience. 

“Want to go checkout your brother’s boyfriend’s place?” She asked. Dante tipped his head back considering. “C’mon, s’not his fault there was a scene.” 

“It’s not that,” he blew out a long breath. “I don’t know if he really wants me there. He’s figured himself out. Doesn’t need me in the background.” 

“Your his big brother. He’ll always need you. At least to tell him to separate his darks from his lights,” she teased and he laughed his marvelous silent laugh because Cisco in his accidentally tie dyed socks was always good for chuckle. 

The house was enormous and her sturdy dependable Honda looked shabbier just sitting on the driveway. Dante frowned and tilted his head towards the road. 

“No way, we committed,” she said just as much for herself as for him. 

The woman who answered the door was so heart stoppingly beautiful that Cassie had to grab Dante’s hand for support. He held back hard. It wasn’t any one thing, more the way she stood and the way she smiled when she saw them like the smile was a favor that she didn’t mind granting. The way she seemed cool as a winter breeze, a balm on the fire that burned in their bellies. 

“Hi, thanks for coming so early.” 

Cassie almost couldn’t return the greeting. 

“Thanks for having us,” she managed after a coughing pause. 

Have us, she wanted to beg, we’re yours. Jesse led them into the dining room and then Dr. Wells walked in. Cassie could see the resemblance, but the same features wore differently on Jesse’s heart shaped face. 

It was a long strange morning and when they got home, they went for each other like they’d been drugged. It had been years since they hadn’t made it to the bedroom. Dante ate her out like he was starving and gave them both carpet burn by taking her halfway across the room. Afterwards, tangled in a sweating pile they renegotiated their relationship in groggy signs. 

“What if she doesn’t want us?” 

“Then we’ll eat a lot of ice cream,” she shrugged. 

It didn’t take long for Jesse to swing back into their orbit. Mostly because Cassie invited her over for lunch, followed by a rapid fire tidying of the apartment. Though Cisco tagged along, he seemed to sense quickly that he was the odd man out. Within the first fifteen minutes, he was playing a game on his phone, his feet up on a chair across the table. 

“See, there’s the Johari Window,” Jesse explained, intense, but not animated. Never animated. She spoke clearly and fluidly, her hands rarely leaving their place around the warm mug of coffee, “There’s a grid with quadrants. What you know about yourself and that others know about you, what only you know about yourself, what only others know about you and the unknowable.” 

“How do we know what we don’t know?” Dante asked, leaning in.

“Exactly,” Jesse leaned back in her chair. “The part of ourselves that’s the most dangerous is the spot we cannot see.” 

Dante rested his fingers against the table and tapped over the wood. 

“Ah, genius brewing,” Cassie winked at Jesse. “You’ve got him thinking about it in notes.” 

“Whatever you come up with, I’d love to hear,” Jesse sighed. “I can’t be less illuminating than the actual research.” 

Jesse was brilliant. Of course she was. Cassie was surrounded by brilliant people, her stunted high school education always struggling to keep up. Sometimes it hurt, the way the concepts flew by and she couldn’t even begin to keep up. Mostly though, she liked the way they talked. The way Dante would write his music with his head in her lap or Cisco would tell her about his latest invention without dumbing down his language, only pausing to find a practical illustration of concept. And now Jesse, who kept coming back, bringing Cassie DVDs of romantic comedies to watch together when Dante was in a composing fugue. Jesse who talked in rich metaphors and could see through people as if they were made of glass. 

Jesse who looked at the shoddy whole made of Cassie and Dante’s broken halves and saw something complete. 

Jesse who learned sign language with diligence and without expectation of praise. Jesse who ate all of Dante’s burnt offerings until they mellowed into something edible. Jesse, who shyly scooted further and further down the couch on movie nights until she was practically in Cassie’s lap. 

Jesse, who caught Cassie and Dante making out in the music room of the Wells’ house, and politely closed the door and walked away. 

Cassie followed, Dante at her back. 

“Hey,” Cassie touched the back of Jesse’s retreating hand. 

“It’s fine,” Jesse’s shoulders knotted together. “I should’ve knocked.” 

“It’s your house,” Cassie huffed. “Anyway, I’m not sorry you walked in. I’m sorry you walked out.” 

Somewhere else in the house, there was a muffled thud and a moan. The three of them froze and looked up the stairs. 

“How about we go get ice cream?” Cassie suggested. “In fact, I have some in our freezer.” 

“That sounds good,” Jesse was already starting for her shoes. “Please.” 

Dante sat in the back seat, his arms folded around Cassie’s headrest. His breath was unsteady in her ear. Jesse had one foot up on the seat, an arm wrapped around it. There was plenty of ice cream, a stockpile of sexually frustrated Ben and Jerry’s that they could share with warring spoons. 

“The thing is, J,” Cassie borrowed some courage from a deep reserve. 

“Don’t,” Jesse dropped her spoon with nerveless fingers. “I can’t. Ever since...” 

There was a world of meaning in the trailing pause and Cassie hesitantly offered her a hand. Jesse took it and squeezed it gratefully. 

“We just want you here,” Dante signed. “Anyway you want to be here.” 

“Thank you,” she said quietly. “Being touched like that...I tried with this one boy. Nice enough, but I had a panic attack. It’s too much exposure. Too much...much.” 

“But this is okay, right?” Cassie gestured to their hands. 

“Yes. Hugs. Kissing if it isn’t with intent.” 

“We can do that,” Dante took Jesse’s other hand. 

“What about watching?” Cassie suggested, glancing at Dante who lifted his eyebrows and then his gaze went a bit distant and cloudy. “....and I lost him.” 

“I think you lost me too,” Jesse said faintly. 

They tried it and it worked startlingly well. Jesse was the perfect observer, a palpable presence without being distracting. When they finished, sweating and aching, she crawled in beside Cassie. Her clothes were surprisingly soft and she’d slipped off her shoes. The point of her painted nails grazed Cassie’s arm. Dante reached over and tapped Jesse once on the nose and winked. 

“Yes, everyone is impressed by your magic penis,” Cassie pat his slightly sticky stomach, then wiped her hands on his discarded shirt.

Jesse didn’t say a word, though she kissed the tip of Cassie’s shoulder and pulled the covers up over them all. She was good at that. Remembering to keep everyone warm and fed. Cassie had never known anyone like that before, who kept tabs on their people so closely. Maybe too closely, but Cassie enjoyed the way Jesse put her pert nose into their business and fixed things before anyone knew they were broken. 

“My mom was like that,” Jesse blinked back tears when Cassie managed to put it into words a few weeks later. They were sitting on the lawn of the Wells’ house, soaking in the fleeting midday warmth. “She was so good at anticipating things. Like she could see the future.” 

“My mom really really wasn’t,” Cassie said simply. And Jesse hooked her chin around Cassie’s shoulders, their cheeks together and held her close. 

Dante stretched out at their feet and Cassie set her bare feet on his chest, wiggled her toes under his chin while he swatted at them lazily. Jesse hid a kiss behind Cassie’s ear, small and sweet. 

They made slow progress. Turning a duet into a trio took time and care. Jesse stretched herself with a kiss here and a caress there. Neither Dante nor Cassie dared to initiate, so she came slowly, slowly towards them. 

The night before the wedding, Jesse tucked herself into their bed between them. 

“Touch me,” she asked and they did. Their hands traced the lines out of her body. Tomorrow, she would be pillar as strong as marble for her father. Tonight, she was soft and scared, but brave. 

Dante and Cassie worked well together and talking with their bodies was their specialty. They told Jesse she was loved, that she was precious. She was learning how to reply. 

“He won’t forget her, right?” she asked when they were on the verge of sleep. 

“If she was even a fifth as amazing as you, I don’t think anyone ever could,” Dante sketched in the air. 

“Especially not the man that loved her for twenty years.” 

“Nineteen years, ten months, three weeks, six days, twenty-one minutes,” she corrected. 

“Twenty years,” Cassie kissed the corner of her eye, the rise of her cheek. “Some things deserve to be rounded up.” 

So Jesse shouldn’t have been surprised when Cassie and Dante showed up blue haired a few days before their official six month anniversary. 

“Hi?” She swung the door open. “Did I forget a date?” 

“Nope!” Cassie held up a bundle of pink roses. “Behold our crazy and spontaneous bohemian lifestyle.” 

“We got tickets to see a magician and a reservation at the new Greek place near our apartment,” Dante elaborated. “Happy nearly six months.” 

“Oh,” Jesse took the flowers and studied them intently as if they were something utterly alien to her. “That’s...I was going to do something nice. For you two.” 

“And you still can,” Cassie shrugged. “But we like taking care of you. On Saturday, you can take care of us. It’s a beautiful round.” 

“And the dye?” She touched her own hair reflexively as if it might take on a new hue in sheer sympathy. 

“Little bird told us that you have a thing about blue,” Dante smiled. “Not much for formal wear, but Cassie likes her dyes.” 

“Go put your flowers in water,” Cassie took pity on Jesse, who seemed rocked by this revelation. “We’ll wait out here for you to get ready.” 

The last of the summer light was leaving. Cassie watched it dance over the woods. When the door opened, she turned back around with a delighted smile at the ready. It faded immediately when she found Dr. Wells where his daughter should’ve been. 

“Good evening, Cassie. Dante.” 

“Heya,” Cassie gave an aborted wave. 

“Jesse is getting dressed and possibly trying to burst my husband’s eardrums for reasons unknown.” 

“Our fault,” Dante looked suitably chagrined. “We bribed him for information.” 

“We wanted to do something special for her,” Cassie shrugged. As far as she knew, Jesse had said nothing outright to her father. Not out of secrecy exactly, but something like wounded privacy 

“You should be careful,” Dr. Wells looked out toward the trees, his gaze narrowed. “My daughter...she looks fragile. Maybe she even is sometimes, but she’s mine. And Theresa’s. She’s got razor blades inside of her.” 

“Sir?” Cassie glanced at Dante, who looked equally bewildered. 

“I love her, but I know her. She will dissect, manipulate and lay you out if she thinks there’s a need.” 

“How can you-” 

Wells stare fell on her, strong as a slap. 

“I’m meant to warn you of what I’d do if you hurt her, but frankly, I think you deserve to be warned more. I don’t have the ability to hide what I am and that’s been...fortunate in it’s own way. Jesse may have the ability to see other people, but she’s blind to herself.” 

“We love her, Dr. Wells,” Cassie lifted her chin. 

“Good,” he turned on his heels. 

“Your brother has nuts of steel,” Cassie decided and Dante nodded, eyes wide. 

The night went well, despite its ominous beginning. The magician was awful in an enjoyable way and Jesse kept reaching over to touch their hair as if she couldn’t stop herself. At the restaurant, they only had a tiny table set aside and their legs mixed altogether beneath it. Drinks were had, enough that Jesse had a lovely splotch of pink to her cheeks and Dante’s signs gained a liquid slurring quality. 

“C’mon, ya lushes,” Cassie chided them up and onto the street. “Fresh air will clear everyone’s brains up good.” 

They walked, laughing and distracted. They didn’t hear the man come up behind them until the muzzle of the gun was pressed to Cassie’s spine. 

“I want everything in your pockets,” he growled. 

Dante and Jesse stopped a few steps ahead, registering her dead stop. Jesse’s hand went to her belt and that was when a second man came out of the alley. 

“And I’d like some time alone with this one,” the second man cocked his head at Cassie and wiggled his eyebrows. 

Dante spun on him ready to swing, but the second man was equally armed. Cassie took a deep breath. Jesse’s bodyguards should’ve stopped these guys. Cassie had liked the guys that dogged their steps. They’d always been respectful. She hoped they were only injured and not dead. 

“Please,” Jesse held out her purse in front of her. “Take it. Just don’t hurt us.” 

The fear in her voice was all too real. A surge of rage choked out Cassie’s own fear. She found Dante’s gaze and he returned it with a question, not signed, not even a fully formed thought. Her nod was all he needed. 

“Jesse, babe,” Cassie said low and soothing, “Put down the purse. Cover your ears.” 

To her credit, Jesse did what she was told. It was nice to be trusted. As soon as Jesse’s hands landed on her ears, Cassie ducked down and did the same, heedless of the man behind her. He wouldn’t have the time to react. 

Dante opened his mouth and screamed. 

It was the sound of worlds dying, of stars exploding and reality tearing itself asunder. Cassie clenched her hands closer to her head, tears coursing down her face. She had imagined it would be terrible. She had imagined it would terrify her. She hadn’t thought that it would make her so awfully, horribly sad. 

It faded out slowly, the reverberations falling around them like snow. Cassie stood shakily upward. The man with the gun stayed down, one hand twitching. The second man would never move again. 

“What was that?” Jesse asked. Or at least Cassie thought she did. Her hearing was still ringing. 

Dante put a hand to his mouth. At first Cassie thought it some kind of horrified reaction. Then she saw the blood spilling from his mouth. She screamed his name or tried. 

“You’re okay,” she grabbed at him. “You’re okay, right? You’ve done this before and been okay.” 

He rested his forehead against hers, utterly limp. She shook him, 

"You're not allowed to be not okay. You're not, you here me?" 

She didn’t know when Penumbra had shown up. Didn’t know how they’d managed to pry her off of Dante and get her in the car. Jesse sat so closely beside her that Cassie was forced to put an arm around her shoulders. The Wells house, usually so foreboding and massive, was a relief. It’s fortress walls enclosed them and drew them deep inside. 

“He tore his throat to mincemeat,” Cisco put a mug of something warm into her hands. His eyes were bruised and his voice too steady, Penumbra still clinging to him. “But he’s going to be fine. I- Cassie. Why didn’t he tell me?” 

“You’ll have to ask him,” she curled terribly small at Jesse’s side. “I’m tired now.”

“Are you actually tired?” Jesse asked when they were alone in her bedroom. Cassie loved Jesse’s bedroom with it’s crisp white sheets and plush rugs spread over the wooden floor. “Or are you avoiding the question?” 

“It’s Dante’s to tell, not mine,” she started to crawl under the covers, freezing when she realized. “Are you mad that we didn’t tell you?” 

“A little,” Jesse pulled back blanket and tugged at Cassie’s hand. “Why didn’t you?” 

“We didn’t tell anyone. Dante wouldn’t let me. He only told me because he was so scared.” 

“Scared of what?” 

“He killed a man that tried to hurt him,” Cassie closed her eyes, her lie turning to truth. She was so very tired. “Cisco thought he’d done it, but it was Dante. He thought that something Cisco did made the sound go away. He thought that if anyone knew, that would be the last straw. His parents would have him locked away somewhere.” 

“So he let Cisco think he’d killed someone?” 

“He would’ve if he’d had the chance,” Cassie sighed. “They’re no angels, the Ramons. They’re just little boys who grew up to find bigger firecrackers.” 

“What do you mean?” Jesse demanded, but Cassie had slipped into the oblivious dark of sleep.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dante is good at everything. Except being a big brother.

Dante was born to be good at things. He walked, talked and read early. When his mother sat him down next to her at the piano bench, he was playing simple songs within the hour. He was a good son, appeasing his mother’s need for reflected glory and giving his father the right amount of respect. 

He was lousy at being a big brother.

He knew he would be from the moment his mother explained to him why her tummy was getting round. He hated the unborn thing that would still attention and time from him. When Cisco was born, everyone said he was a quiet baby, but Dante heard him screaming in his dreams and woke furious. 

It didn’t help that Cisco loved him. Wanted to follow him and cling to his legs all the time. Everyone heaped praise on Dante’s head as if this affection were somehow earned, but when their backs were turned he was forever pushing Cisco away. 

“Stop it!” He’d screech. “Your hands are sticky and your face is stupid!” 

Cisco would only stare at him, one finger in his mouth where a tooth was growing in and his eyes wide as dinner plates. As soon as Dante turned his back, Cisco would be at his elbow again. Even when Dante played the piano, Cisco would sit under the bench and play with his hand-me-down toys that bore the marks of Dante’s young temper. 

As they got older, the message started to sink in and Cisco would hang further back. Never gone, not entirely, but always at the edges of things with shadowed eyes. Their parents ignored or belittled his brother and Dante said nothing because was greedy for the praise he got in it’s wake. 

“Take him along,” one of Dante’s supposed friends said on the fateful day when Dante’s failure as a brother was sealed. “Little kids make good lookouts.” 

The cigarette caught Dante off guard with it’s harsh burst of smoke that scratched at his lungs. He started coughing as he passed it along and his eyes squeezed shut with tears. That’s when the world broke. 

“Dante!” One of his friend’s shook him hard. “What the fuck?” 

The middle of the lot had been transformed, a perfect circle punched through the air letting through a brilliant light. It was beautiful and frightening and dizzying. Everyone was sensibly backing away or had already fled. 

Everyone, but Cisco. Cisco with his dirty sneakers and hair a thousand different lengths was walking towards it as if hypnotized. He had one hand reaching out as if he could see something perfect just a fingers’ length away. 

“Cisco!” Dante snapped. “You lamebrain, get back here!” 

Cisco didn’t turn, didn’t seem to hear. He kept moving. The light twitched, expanded and faintly stretched into forms that could have been arms. They reached for Cisco as if to embrace him. 

And Cisco looked so damn happy. That snapped Dante back to reality. He raced across the dirt and reached Cisco just before the reaching arms did. 

“You can’t have him,” he snarled. Cisco registered no reaction, kept trying to walk forward despite his hold. “What is wrong with you?” 

“Can’t you hear that?” Cisco murmured. 

It was so faint, so quiet that Dante almost missed it. One thready voice singing one long note that flowed over the skin. It tickled into Dante’s nose and mouth and wormed it’s way into his stomach, filling it with sluggish warmth. 

It told him to let go. And he did. 

For a crucial second, he let Cisco go. Because he wanted to hear that voice more than he wanted to save his brother. The light touched Cisco at last, shivering in exultance. At last, Cisco came back to himself and his face went from bliss to terror in an instant. He opened his mouth to scream, but the light was already upon him. 

“Get off of him!” Dante yelled, giving voice to their joint fears. 

The light’s attention turned and Dante stood paralyzed with fear as the voice turned cold and bitter in his throat. It stayed very still and then it twisted hard, breaking something vital inside of him. 

_Too fragile,_ the voice hummed. both of you. You will not do. 

“That’s not true!” Dante groaned. 

The open circle of light snapped shut, sending out a wave of energy that knocked them both to the ground. Cisco started sobbing, open rough tears that wet the dirty beneath them. Dante only stared at the sky with raw, dry eyes. He opened his mouth to tell Cisco to get up. 

The sound that issued from his throat lasted only a split second, but it left him shaking and afraid. Cisco had rolled into a ball to escape it, his entire body a mass of vibration. Something cracked and blood dripped down Dante’s face and into his eyes. 

He got to his feet with deadly clarity. Plucking Cisco off the ground, he carried his brother the two blocks home. Their parents were still out, so he carefully left Cisco on the couch, walked into his own room and shut the door. For three years, he only left to use the bathroom, shower and eat. 

And Cisco never left him alone. He brought him treats from the outside world on good days when Dante could stand the sight of him and told him about his day through the door on bad days. He listened to Dante play, not with the careful reverence of their parents, but with a greedy need. As if the sound was sustaining him. 

Gradually, the world filtered back in. He would leave with his parents now and then. Sometimes Cisco could manage to coax him outside, their positions so firmly flipped that people actually asked how much older Cisco was than his brother, despite Dante’s extra inches. 

Everywhere, Dante had to step lively to avoid the terrible hum that was a dim reminder of his own foul scream. He kept his teeth locked tight together for every moment they were outside, shielding himself from what might be coaxed out. 

It was an indoor day when Cisco brought home a soda and news. 

“Cassie’s back,” he said with a half-smile. “Remember her?” 

He could see her perfectly in his mind’s eye. Her sly smile and dirty sneakers. The long ponytail that swung around whiplike. She had been a friend when there had been none. Her loyalty so fierce that she had withstood the barrage of his parent’s disapproval as if she noticed nothing at all. Maybe she hadn’t. 

“Dante?” Cisco said softly. “You want me to see if she’ll come by?” 

He froze for a moment, then nodded. Cisco hid a smile as he charged out down the hall. Dante never let anyone in. Going out was hard enough. But he knew Cassie. She had been in and out of his room a dozen times. There was a small pen mark on the wall behind his bed where she had accidently run off the paper. 

She re-entered his life with a hesitant step and all the ripples of a pebble in an ocean. She changed everything with her frank gaze and soft fingertips. Dante hadn’t thought much about girls since the explosion. Hadn’t considered them as a possibility. Then she was there with her woman’s body and girlish laugh. 

That he would fall in love with her was inevitable. She swelled into all the empty spaces left behind. That she would love him in return was miraculous. With the quick trip of her fingers, she gave him back a voice. With her needs and expectations, she forced him to become a man. 

When she embraced him, bloody and shaking with fear, she accepted him at his lowest, scummiest moment. He confessed in the stillness of her bedroom. 

“I was me. Cisco is going go to jail for life because they think I’m too pathetic to do anything and I let them think it.” 

She said nothing, rolled over onto her back and stared at the ceiling. He waited for her judgement. 

“We’ll see how it plays out,” she said finally. “If it gets serious, I’ll tell them that I saw something.” 

“You’d perjure yourself?” 

“I’d do what I had to do. For him. For you. Neither of you belongs behind bars.”   
They waited a long time. Dante couldn’t bring himself to visit his brother in jail with the terrible hum of the institutional lighting and the churning thurm of guilt. Their parents refused to see him, his mother reduced to tears when Dante did more than hint that she should. 

Cassie went. She brought him his comics and long letters Dante wrote in the margins of new compositions. He wrote a lot of things. Memories, mostly, from when they were small. Stories their mother had told them that Cisco had always insisted on poking holes in. Anything, but an apology because he didn’t know where to begin. 

“You have to swallow it down or own up,” Cassie touched the tip of their noses together. 

“Which one?” He creased his brow and she smoothed it down. 

“That’s between you and the Almighty, babe.” 

He swallowed it down. Cisco came home different. He sounded and looked the same, but Dante knew him. Knew the texture of his brother had fundamentally changed. And he still couldn’t say anything. 

He wrote a song that won an award. He made Cassie come so hard that she blacked out. He left the apartment on his own for the first time in years and bought his own soda with money he’d earned writing music. 

Cisco left them. Went to college and never really came back. 

Dante was still a success. Except as a brother. The failure corroded him. He sent Cisco money for books. Remembered the kid’s birthday for the first time in years. But it was all spit in the ocean. 

Years ticked on and their connection thinned to a whisper, texts sent and stiff family meals shared. Cisco grew leaner, harder and twitchier. He spoke less and less in front of their parents, refusing to offer details even when asked which wasn’t like him. 

Then all at once, his little brother was back. 

“I got a job!” He even called over texting. Well, he called Cassie so he could talk to both of them. “They took me at Star Labs. Well, I say the, but it was Doctor Fucking Wells!” 

“That’s some first name,” Cassie laughed, the sound bells playing over Cisco’s chimes. “Thought you said the labs wouldn’t take you.” 

“He owns the labs,” Cisco whooped. “Barged into the interview and he actually read my dissertation!” 

“We tried!” Dante signed. Because he had. He really really had. But he wasn’t much of a student to begin with and Cisco had a genius for obscurity. 

“We did,” Cassie confirmed. 

“Right, but he gets it. Like he actually got it. Even my mentor didn’t really know what I was doing. Oh fuck, what if I’m not what he expects though? It’s full time, so I have to quit everything else and then what if-” 

“You can do it,” Dante tried to convey to Cassie how strongly to say it. 

“We believe in you,” she said instead and that was better. 

“Thanks,” Cisco hummed. “I gotta go. There’s something I have to make before tomorrow.” 

“Well,” Cassie slid her phone into her pocket. “That’s interesting.” 

Dante said nothing. He didn’t want to ruin the glow of hope. Maybe Cisco could be happy. Maybe Dante could redeem himself somehow. He read up on Dr. Wells and the labs, using empty hours while Cassie worked and the music was quiet in his head. Chasing down hints, he discovered a man with a strong mind and stern face. His employees liked him though. Editorials were mixed on his hand in creating metahumans, but seem to come down on his side for the most part. 

_You should see this before your parents do_ Cassie texted him in the middle of her morning. 

She passed on a link to a gossip blog, full of pictures of celebrities without makeup and politicians picking their noses. The post wasn’t at the top and only had a single blurry picture. It was definitely Cisco, his face turned upwards as he listened to his Dr. Wells. He was smiling, a small private kind of smile that Dante hadn’t seen before. Wells wasn’t, but he was looking at Cisco so intently that it made Dante uncomfortable. Their hands were joined, fingers criss-crossing. 

_They look happy._ he sent back. _Happy as you make me._

_Sap._ she sent back followed by a dozen heart eye emojis. He made her mac and cheese for dinner even though he hated the bland mash. She deserved her favorites once and awhile. 

It took him months to agree and then a week to text Cisco. 

_I’ve got a gig. Please come._

_AWESOME! DETAILS!_ Followed by a picture of Cisco giving him two thumbs up and some odd robot hand adding in a third. 

Dante had to sit down hard on the floor. 

They fought at the concert. Cisco asked if they could go out afterwards and Dante had told him about their parents plans for a party with their friends. Cisco had stormed off, after using words like ‘coward’. Dante retreated to tend his wounds while working up the courage to play. He barely noticed his brother’s boyfriend watching him with detached coolness. 

He certainly didn’t notice his brother’s boyfriend’s daughter sitting in the audience. 

It was Cassie who got the invitation and Dante who wanted to make up for...everything and nothing and agreed. Even though he hated the idea of going somewhere new that he hadn’t had a chance to circle a few times and get the taste of before venturing inwards. 

“Thanks for coming so early,” Jesse opened the door and Dante caught the fleeting expression on Cassie’s face. An expression reserved for him. 

He had vowed never to hold her back. Not after what he’d done. Not after everything she’d done for him. He would let her go if he had too. He would find a way. When Jesse turned her back, Cassie signed at him frantically, 

“We’re gonna woo her, right? You’re the one that’s good with the flirting. Use your eyelashes!” 

Relief flooded through him as he signed his agreement. Jesse seemed fine. He could learn to like her if it meant keeping Cassie. Maybe they could do their thing and leave him out of it entirely. 

Luck was with him. Jesse was easy to like. She made his brother laugh and her father’s sternnness melt. She could sing well enough to enjoy their long sessions with his piano. 

And she made Cassie glow. Every time Jesse called or came over or said something clever or sneezed in that cute high pitched way, Cassie would look on her like she was a divine revelation. 

When it was just the two of them, Jesse asked him to teach her how to sign. 

“Cassie’s better at it.” 

“But it’s your language. I want to speak it the way it feels on your hands.” 

Which made as little sense to him as any of it. But it was...well. He kissed her and taught her and she found her niche inside of him without too much work on either of their parts. For Cassie’s sake he’d liked her, for his own he came to love her. 

Their sixth month anniversary came quicker than he could track and ended in him on his knees, covered in blood. He’d had better. His throat burned and he couldn’t stop coughing. Cassie was all over him, her hands painting worry and fear on him. 

A shadow fell over them. Dante tilted his head back to face the grim spectre of his little brother. Penumbra spread out his hands and plucked Cassie from him. Dante’s vision greyed and then there was silence. 

The hospital was full of the wrong kind of music. When Dante came to, he had tears tracking down his face in unconscious reaction to the assault. 

“Here,” a hand extended into his vision. Sitting in the palm were earplugs and he stantched them up with grateful speed, closing himself off to the stomach churning sounds. Stimulus removed, he could take in his surroundings. 

Private room. One chair. Occupied by Cisco’s doctor. 

“It’s 2 am,” Harrison had a thick periodical on his lap. His signing was stiff, formal. Much like his speaking voice. 

“Jesse?” Dante asked. “Cassie?” 

“They’re both fine. Sleeping, I should hope.”

“Good,” he sagged back against the pillows. “Is Cisco mad?” 

“I don’t think that’s the right word for it,” Harrison paused, apparently searching for the right signs. “He believes that he deserved to be kept in the dark. That you have a right to your secrets.” 

“He didn’t.” 

“No,” Harrison agreed. “He’s at home, if you’re wondering. I persuaded him to let me sit with you given that he was still in his suit.” 

“How did he find us?” 

“Jesse carries a beacon. It’s implanted in her palm, easy to activate. She also had a gun that she was pulling when you...I don’t have the sign for that. If there is one.” 

“We just use scream.” 

“We.” Harrison said flatly. 

“Cassie knows.” 

“I see,” Harrison looked away, the lines tense around his eyes. 

“It’s my fault,” he confessed, eager now to be down with it all. “I killed that man. It was my fault. Not Cisco’s.” 

“The man that tried to break your fingers and worse?” Harrison lifted his eyebrows. “Save me from the Ramon guilt. He tried, you succeeded. Maybe. Maybe it was the other way around. But it was self-defense. No jury would’ve put either of you behind bars.” 

“He did the time.” 

“He did the time because your parents refused to advocate for him,” Harrison said it outloud, barely audible through the plugs. “Because they failed him. You were a shaking shut in. If you’d confessed, you would probably been sent to some mental care facility and never let out. Cisco knew that.” 

“I failed him.” 

“We all fail each other,” Harrison picked up his journal, apparently done with the conversation. “How we change after that is what matters.” 

Dante rolled that over and over in his head. He didn’t sleep. The next morning specialists looked him over and it was decided that only time would heal the wounds. Harrison was still there, taking brisk notes and asking pointed questions until one of the younger doctors looked like she might cry. 

No one asked to see his insurance. Instead, they gave him painkillers strong enough to numb him from the chin down and a good portion upwards too. A car arrived and took them back to the Wells’ manor. Dante wanted their apartment so badly it hurt, but when they pulled up it was to find Cassie sitting on the steps with Jesse between her legs getting her hair braided. 

Cisco was weeding the garden. It was a small patch, left alone by the obsessive gardeners. He was growing carrots and tomatoes, doting on the sprouts with tender care. There was a fat bandage on his arm from a knife wound a few nights before. There was nothing small or weak or annoying about him. 

His little brother had grown up, grown out, grown strong. He wouldn’t break under the weight of Dante’s stupid secrets. Even as the girls came to embrace him, he was looking at this unfamiliar man with his cuts and bruises and tender hands and broad smile. 

“You look like you might live,” Cisco said gruffly when the fussing was mostly done. He stood a few feet away, spade tapping against his thigh. 

“Hey, little brother,” Dante spoke, softly, softly, through the raw meat of his throat. None of his ugly scream came through. It hurt. “You’ve got dirt on your nose.” 

Cassie buried her face in his shoulder and cried. Jesse clapped hands over her mouth and bounced. 

“You sound fucking terrible,” Cisco choked. 

And Dante figured then that they would be alright.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is Jesse's story. So there are a few things to warn for. They may be spoiler-y, so I've tucked them in the end notes for this chapter.

Jesse May Quick-Wells was born three weeks early in the last frost of the year. She was fair as her mother and her eyes stayed the same clear blue of a newborn for the rest of her life. 

Her first memory was hanging from her father’s hands and swinging between his legs while her mother talked at a podium, camera lights flashing. It could’ve been any number of moments, but Jesse was sure it was the opening of Star Labs. They were nearly the same age, she and Star. In many ways, Star was the sibling she never had. 

She grew up in the steel and glass hallways, playing with tinker toys to copy molecular structures drawn up on chalkboards and doing her homework with some of the finest minds in America checking her grammar.

It was strange to look at her life in retrospect, so colored by the information she now had. Before the age of fourteen, she thought everything was perfect. Her parents were together and still in love, they treated her with respect and affection even if they didn’t always have classic ways of showing it. 

Or her mother didn’t, anyway. Her father adhered to some script that he kept in his head and his own drive to protect his own. He showed his love in stiff, but honest hugs and picking her up from school everyday without fail even though it meant leaving work when he was just getting started. He would ask good questions too, about her friends and what trades she’d made on her lunch and if her teacher was acknowledging her the same amount as everyone else. 

Her mother was different. She wasn’t like anyone else's mother, who dropped them off in a minivan in their pajamas or gave embarrassing lipstick kisses while kitted out for work in bright colors. She wasn’t even like the other executive mothers, busy and rushing from place to place with chaotic competence. 

Jesse’s mother was made of icy calm and brilliance. She rarely hugged, never kissed and wouldn’t have known where to drop Jesse off if someone drew her map. In fact, she rarely drove at all preferring to sit in the backseat and do work as the world slid by. She showed her love by introducing Jesse to her world. From the very beginning, Jesse wasn’t locked out of board meetings or conference calls. She was never shushed if she brought up a point, no matter how inane or irrelevant. 

She’d once told the president of the Kellogg corporation that the tie he was wearing would look better on her because it was a nice shade of purple. He’d shipped it to the Wells’ home the very next day and Jesse wore it around the labs for weeks. 

“You’ve got a good knack for people,” her mother would say and hand Jesse the lipstick she wanted, showing her how to apply it without getting it on her teeth. “I have no idea where you got it from, but I hope you keep it.” 

Her mother rarely said no. She asked why instead. Jesse had to craft good arguments, concise and clear with compelling points. She earned her way into most of her toys and many of the trips that they went on. She was her mother’s constant companion at trade shows and conferences, taking notes once she was old enough to write legibly while her mother stared into middlespace and took naps with her eyes open. 

“You have to make the most of every moment of the day,” her mother would say when applause stirred her awake. 

Too young to understand the science, Jesse studied the scientists. Instead of physic and chemistry, she absorbed the many flavors of genius that paraded their intellectual wares at podiums. She learned them and found the right people to smile at, the ones who had earned frowns or should be avoided at all costs. 

“Did you learn anything?” her father would ask when they came home. 

“You should hire the guy with the electrowhatsit beams.” 

“Dr. Vinn?” her mother would frown. “Not very sound math.” 

“You can fix it. He’s nice,” Jesse would shrug. They would hire him because the last time they hadn’t hired one of her picks, he’d filed five patents with his new company that undercut four years of research in their biomedical department. 

Jesse liked to remember her mother standing in the doorway, embracing her father after an absence, gently sandwiching Jesse between their legs. They were tall, the bracket of their bodies an arch protecting her. 

One of the few traditional activities her mother indulged in was reading to her at night. Jesse thrived on the attention of her mother sitting on the edge of her bed, her voice animating characters with inflection and accent, no silly voices to be found. When Jesse was old enough, they would take turns, trading off after four or five pages. 

“...now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read: which goes on for ever: in which every chapter is better than the one before,” Her mother closed the battered paperback and let out soft sigh. 

“It’s over?” Jesse echoed the sigh. “What a weird ending.” 

“What do you think it means?” her mother leaned back onto Jesse’s pile of pillows. She was still wearing her suit, but the jacket was discarded and the top button of her silk blouse undone. A diamond rested in the hollow her throat, a gift from her husband that never left her neck, regardless of the appropriateness.

“I guess it’s meant to be heaven, right? Since Aslan is a Jesus figure.” 

“Forget what Lewis intended,” her long fingers waved away authorial intent with a flick. “What does it mean to you?” 

“That when you reach your goals, there’s always another one?” Jesse tried. She was thirteen, a few months from fourteen. She was wearing a white nightgown with a recent stain that she had tucked under thigh so her mother wouldn’t notice it. 

“That’s a valid interpretation,” her mother’s feet were encased in stockings, the gleam of a deep red polish shining through the mesh as they curled in and then arched outwards. 

“What’s yours?” 

“There is always something more beyond our sight,” she said softly. “Another hill to climb. Another sun to rise. And it will be higher, brighter, better.” 

Then she wished Jesse sweet dreams and disappeared down the hall, taking the book with her. It was the last conversation they had. For many years, Jesse thought that was odd coincidence as if her mother had possessed some preternatural sense that she should leave with her last bit of coolly delivered wisdom. 

Becoming motherless began with the ghost of her father in the doorway of their classroom. He had never in her memory turned up unplanned. Especially not with a tremor in one hand and his glasses missing. He held out one hand to her and for a moment it seemed no one else had noticed him. 

Then everyone turned to look at her as one, the teacher’s voice shakily giving out reassurances as she gathered her things and reached to grasp his extended hand. The skin was cold and damp. His eyes were dry and red. 

She went with him, his shoes whisper quiet on the tile and her own flats squeaking along, a terrifying punctuation in the silence. He never said the words to her. Not entirely. He said individual words like “Your mother” and “accident” and “interaction” and “funeral”. They were jigsaw pieces falling out of his mouth as he drove. 

Her tears started as the pulled into the driveway and the house already seemed so empty, it’s windows wide vacant eyes without her mother’s pacing behind them to send shadows cascading around the yard. 

“Daddy,” her voice broke and he was pulling her close, over the gearshift, so she could pile small into his lap with the steering wheel pressing against her spine. 

“I’m sorry,” he held her closely, his arms iron around her. “I’m so sorry, Jesse.” 

The car got cold and the world went dark before he pulled them both out and carried her into the house. She couldn’t remember the last time anyone had carried her anywhere, but he didn’t seem willing to put her down and she wanted badly for him to protect her. 

At the funeral, they stood as two pillars and Jesse perversely wanted her mother there to bracket her other side. She was exposed and vulnerable to too many eyes without the missing bookend. Her did not weep, but she kept her head bent down so people couldn’t tell. Above her, her father was still and blank. 

Every day that followed was exercise in new uncertainty. Could she ask her father about things she had once asked her mother? Could she tell her friends how it really felt to lose a parent or did she have to put up a good face? Could she cry in the middle of her useless earth science class when her teacher talked about black holes? 

Would she ever be able to breathe without the pressure of a thousand weights on her chest? 

The calendar took the immediacy away, months without her mother falling away and leaving her lighter and harder like one of her father’s experimental metals. She read only to herself and no longer attended conferences about equations and quasars. Her father rarely went to such things and he never fell asleep during the talks. 

“You can come if you want to, but I thought you’d rather stay home with your friends,” he looked bewildered when she asked, already harried by thoughts of travel. “You can have them over if you want.” 

“I will pay you a dollar if you can name one of them,” she challenged. 

“Jesse...” 

“I don’t have real friends,” she declared and stormed off to her room, slamming the door. It wasn’t her usual style, but she knew other people her age did things like that. The gesture was empty, devoid of any real anger. 

She never felt things strongly. She had never been taught how. Her parents always seemed to be stumbling through the motions of the usual adult drama, putting on the air of anger or petty fights. Only their passions had felt tangible, the way her mother would write out equations until her pencils shattered in her grip or her father would gaze at her mother as if she were the only point in the universe that emanated light. 

It surprised her that her father came to her after her tantrum. He sat down on her bed, scrubbed his face with his hands and then turned to face her. 

“Vivian, Marcus, Bonnie and the red head with the nose.” 

“James,” she offered. 

“James,” he repeated as if committing it to memory though she could practically see the detail leaving his brain. “What about them?”

“They’re not like me. They want me to care about things I don’t care about. Like television shows or movies or whatever. And that’s fine, I can fake it, but they don’t know I’m faking it. So how good a friend can any of them be?” 

“Ah,” he titled his head back, studied her white ceiling, “your mother had no friends. I have no friends.” 

“I’ve noticed.” 

“It’s not a recommendable state,” he shrugged loosely. “You have friends. I’ve always been...proud that you’ve managed that. Being false with people you care about seems to be the way of the world. If it makes you uncomfortable, then stop. You are a very lovable person, daughter of mine. Even when you aren’t pretending.” 

So Jesse took his advice just to see. Because she only had his advice now. She was surprised that none of them noticed the difference or found her cynical detachment funny. She even made new friends. She learned the right way to pretend for some of them, trying on masks that were comfortable. If she didn’t want to be alone, she didn’t have to be. She could summon company easily and dismiss it with the same amount of effort. 

“I could become prom queen,” she told her father a few years down the line while she made him waffles. 

“Do you want to be?” 

“I think I’d rather be valedictorian.” 

“I wasn’t aware they were mutually exclusive.” 

“No one likes a show off, Dad.” 

“That would explain a lot,” he said mildly. And she laughed at him. She was allowed now. The bizarre shift of their family had leveled some of the usual uneven ground between them. She could act like an equal within reason. Too much and he would raise an eyebrow that made her feel like a foolish child. 

College took her to a dorm and she picked her way through the right friends at the right places, happy in her own way. She took notes in class and imagined her mother dozing beside her. She choose a school close to home and she often returned on the weekends to recharge herself in the familiar quiet or bother her father at the labs. 

It was on one such weekend that she decided to browse through her mother’s books. An assignment for a class was on her mind though later she could recall none of the details. Because wedged in among the tomes of learning, there was a soft paperback with it’s broken spine. Jesse pulled The Last Battle free and a square of heavy paper came loose. 

Plucking it up, she found it to be a piece of stationery with her mother’s name embossed in bright blue on the cream paper. Beneath it there were a few lines in dark blue ink. 

Two names. Medications. Below that, a hesitation mark, the beginning of a word that faded into spidery nothingness. 

An S. An O. A fragmented R left hanging. 

Jesse stared at it, tried to make sense of it. 

Her mother was brilliant and through and organized. Her mother had never tipped her hand about whatever stirred in her heart. 

It occurred to Jesse as steady as a sharp knife over thick veins that she had never known her mother as a person. Only the warping lense of a child craning their neck to look upwards. Only as a protected, cherished, but vulnerable entity to be held at a safe distance. 

Was it an apology or an acronym or a chemical notation or place to work out a crossword answer before it was transcribed? Had it been left in their last book deliberately or an accident of fate? Should she show it to her father? 

Only the last question came with a definitive answer. No. Never. He would be consumed by the whys and wherefores. He would agonize over if it was some flaw in himself or their life. What good would come of speculation? 

Jesse tucked the paper back in the book and brought it back to school with her, letting it simmer under her mattress. It came with her through the next two years, a hanging question. 

Then there was Zoom. 

She had known that her father was involved in some less than ethically savory work. She had asked, sideways and then dead on. She had thought she understood and that some simple pouting on her part might change his mind. She didn’t know that the damage had already been done. 

Her time with her torturer stretched like taffy. Her memory of it dim and long and terrible. There had been a lot of pain. A lot of waiting. A lot of reciting everything she could remember from grade school to her last class before being taken just to keep the slow tick of time from driving her out of her wits. 

The saving, when it came, was delivered in red and yellow. The Flash, in any form, would forever be tied to with profound relief and the taste of copper. When she was delivered into her father’s waiting embrace, she clung to him with nails grown long and ragged. She did not weep. There were no tears left, quite literally. Zoom had left her dehydrated and starving towards the end. I.V. bags manifested in their home without evidence of a nurse. 

Her father looked after her. He looked bad, thin and broken. He apologized to her for things real, imagined and only thought. He held her hand and looked her in the eye for long steady minutes. 

He had never done any of those things before. Something in his crazed adventure that he told her about without flare or detail and yet seemed crystalline before her, had paired together the sheared halves of himself and reaffirmed him. 

He had saved her, no matter how long it took or what he had to do, until he reached the point of no return. And he had stepped back from the edge. 

“You looked into the abyss,” she turned to face him though that side of her body was still bruised. “And you didn’t see yourself.” 

“Whatever that means,” he said darkly, but she could see it had registered and cleared some hurdle in his brain. 

With her usual delicacy, she got him back on the right path. He started working at home again and eventually returned to the labs. 

She didn’t stir. She moved as if a leaf on a river, letting it carry her without effort. She wanted nothing. She needed nothing. The therapist she spoke with on the phone had a nice voice. They said things that didn’t resonate. 

“People like you can’t help people like me,” she said eventually. 

“What do you mean?” They asked gently. 

“You want me to deal with my feelings. Those aren’t what I deal in.” 

They didn’t understand. She tried someone else and yet another. None of them were right. None of them really understood. 

The phone call cracked the silence, an old familiar number. 

“Hi, Viv,” Jesse said tentatively. 

“Your father said thank you to me today,” gushed out all at once. “Is everything okay?” 

A month later, Jesse was dogging her father’s footsteps into his office suite (mostly a giant space for him to break, fix and model things in. It was not, notably, the one he had shared with her mother. That was the C.F.O.’s now. It had been ripped down to studs and rebuilt so not a single fingerprint of her mother’s remained. That was how her father mourned, destruction and burning. That was what she hadn’t seen for so long) to meet his new assistant. 

Cisco Ramon had wet looking eyes and rounded shoulders. He looked like a dog too frequently beaten. She left her father to it and went down to the space set aside for her visits. The day went by with small distractions, including a long gossipy chat with Viv, who true to form, did not notice as Jesse put on the mask marked ‘bubbly happy co-ed’. 

Dinner time registered in her stomach and she went back to her father’s office to coax him away. 

“Ah,” she was startled into saying out loud though neither of them noticed. Here was the Cisco that her father had plucked for himself. 

This Cisco was electric. He had a spread of papers before him on the floor and he was gesturing broadly with great animation. The slick ponytail was slowly coming undone and all the frailness of the beginning of the day had disappeared. 

In another lifetime, on another Earth, Jesse would’ve found him first. She would’ve have crushed him down to fit and lived off of him for the rest of her life. He had the vitality that the Quick-Wells lacked, a will to live that they could not rival and a sweet peculiar innocence that could be tarnished, but never killed. 

She befriended him and he never gave her a hint of a mask to use. He accepted her silences and did not fill them. He found her classes and books and arguments to make. He helped her cook and when the day came, he walked with her to her first class on some made up errand that brought him to the school. 

“Thanks, you didn’t have to,” she told him at the doorway. 

“Way less embarrassing than letting your Dad do it. I’m under orders to call him the second the door closes, you know.” 

“I know.” 

She didn’t say that the order filled something necessary in her. That if her father hadn’t demanded it, it would have been harder to take her desk. She didn’t say it because she suspected that Cisco knew. 

He knew a lot of things. He was fluent in many languages. 

The night of the concert stirred memories in her. She returned at last to the book for the first time in nearly a year. She looked at the note with it’s puzzle. It’s hint of some tragic mystery. Rage swept through her, true anger so bright and painful that she thought for a second it might do her real harm. 

She finally understood her father’s temper. She too wanted to break things. Instead, she tore apart the note . 

“You selfish, stupid bitch,” she gritted out, flakes of paper dotting her floor. 

The word burned in her throat and she wanted to take it back as soon as it was out of her mouth. She had spent so long building the careful alter to her mother’s memory that the shattering of it broke inside her like a tidal wave. 

It brought her to her knees. It mixed with the helplessness and rage she had felt all those days under Zoom’s thumb with only the taunt of her remaining family held before her. She heard Cisco’s mother, so full of venom to protect one of her children and cast down the other. 

And some sick deep part of her had heard something familiar. Something she could recognize. 

“Why wasn’t everything enough?” She asked the remains of the paper. “Why wasn’t I enough?” 

She cried again as she hadn’t done in years. Like she had the day her father lost track of her and a stranger gave her candy that she didn’t want because she was lost and she would never ever be found. 

Unlike that day, she was grown enough to have solutions. If not to her own problems then to someone else’s that had done their fair duty by her. Using the lifted phone number, she sent her invitation to the woman mentioned only in passing and invited her to breakfast. Bring the brother. 

Keep Cisco warm while she froze. Jesse could live with that. She could live with a lot of things. 

In the morning, she made her batter and watched as her father strode out of the woods, apparently lighter and happier. Apparently....better. Good. Good. She sucked in a breath and braced her spine with steel. 

They came to the door, shabby and raw. The woman was...soft. She was rounded and generous and her hair was an insane brush of neon. The man was lean and his hands described words in the air. Jesse’s nerves were raw and exposed from the night’s reckoning. Later, she would wonder if it would have hit her so hard otherwise. 

If the morning wouldn’t hit her as so sweet and right. The way that Dante played was more than he had the night before. It was free and easy in a way nothing was anymore. And Cassie sang honey and when Cisco wandered in, he sat by Jesse instead of winding himself around her father. 

“Thanks,” he whispered under music and rhythm and song. Under bridges and under her skin as soft as kindness. Because he knew her. Knew the things she did and the way she left her fingerprints behind. 

“You’re welcome,” she leaned back and closed her eyes. 

Cassie used the first text to build something. A lattice of words for Jesse to climb. She went to their apartment and sat at the far end of the couch, watching as they spoke volumes with small gestures. She watched how Cassie reached out. For Dante, of course, but for Jesse too. Her bold hands would fly and alight on a knee or shoulder or arm. No one had so casually touched her in ages and Jesse wanted to hate it. 

She wanted so badly to hate Cassie’s passions for the inconsequential and Dante’s casual disdain for things he was too afraid to do. She wanted to hate their weaknesses because they were her own, but instead she came to love their strengths which were wholly their own. 

She came back to them, orbiting their binary stars because she could never escape the pull of their combined heat. It drugged her into wanton compliance and led her to do what she hadn’t thought possible. 

“I think she might’ve done it on purpose,” she told them in the deep dark of the night. 

It was after Dante had come home from the hospital. After recriminations and arguments and words like ‘betrayal’ had trailed off into meaningless silence because really. They hadn’t owed her their secrets and she’d never given them any of her own. Until now. 

In their too small bed, bracketed between them. Not bracketed. They bent towards her, tides to her moon’s call. Parentheses to her rogue clause. 

“I’m sorry,” Cassie said softly. And it was wrong. The wrong thing. Cassie never said the wrong thing. 

“Fuck her,” Dante signed and then hesitantly, in his hoarse timid whisper. “She took the easy way. Harder to live through it.” 

And that. That was right. It eased around her and made it palatable. Something her father said often. Better to be a survivor than a fighter. 

She never told anyone else. She didn’t need to. Cassie and Dante were enough. 

They were, as it turned out, enough for her. 

“You know,” her father said casually to her many years later when he had truly become his code name, “when I told you to get your own, I didn’t mean it quite so literally.” 

“Don’t be jealous because I snagged two,” she said sweetly. 

Their joined laughter was loud enough to stir Dante and Cisco where they were pouring over the latest version of their suits. They both looked up, identical expressions of shared amusement and a faint echo of fear on their faces. 

Jesse held up her hand and very reluctantly, her father high-fived her. 

They were surviving.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings: talk of past potential suicide, dealing with trauma and loss of a parent


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> All the things and names that add up to one Cisco Ramon. This chapter contains some past Cisco/OFC and Cisco/OMC.

_ Engineer  _ (Genius) 

Before he knew his own name, Cisco was trying to figure out how to undo the clasps that held him in his baby carrier. When he was tipping over into a year old, he unscrewed the bars that held him in his crib and slipped out on to the soft carpeting. His parents had found him an hour later, merrily pulling tissues out of a box and stuffing them back in. 

Before he was anything else, he’d been an engineer.  Once, when he was delirious with fever in college he had even sprawled ‘engineer’ on the insurance form instead of his name.  The idea that what he did was special didn’t even occur to him until one of his math teachers in middle school took him aside. 

“You’re very far ahead of your peers,” Mrs. Chavez had explained. “I’ve had a hard time getting a hold of your parents to discuss it, but I think you should take some high school classes. At least in math.” 

“But I didn’t do my homework,” he admitted, looking down at the scuffed toes of his shoes. 

“Why didn’t you do it?”

“It’s really boring,” he let it slip and then winced. “I mean, I love math, but...” 

“It’s too easy for you.” 

When his parents dragged their feet, Mrs. Chavez did her best to make the existing classes work for him. Older kids’ used textbooks appeared and he raced through them with new glee. They weren’t exactly what he wanted, but he could tell that he would make the things he could see in his head. 

Even once the word was put to it, a faint whisper of disbelief at the home front ‘genius’  wisping over his head and not quite alighting. Dante was the genius. Cisco was only clever or smart, but lazy. 

“You are the smartest kid I’ve ever met,” Mrs. Chavez hugged him on the last day of school and he hugged her back with desperation.  She helped him do the paperwork, turning a blind eye as a signature or two was forged, and the next year he sat with sophomores with his feet not quite touching the floor. 

He built a bridge out of Popsicle sticks that broke the record for most weight held. He built the perfect container for the egg drop with all six of his eggs surviving their four story descent. There were other teachers, none as good as Mrs. Chavez, but memorable in their own right for the step up the ladder they gave him. 

He went to college at sixteen, taking the dorm room that came with his scholarship despite dire warnings on all sides.  There he could breath and build and blow things up and smell like oil and burning hair and no one gave a goddamn. 

“You’re a genius,” his roommate Sam would say, eyes crossing as he pulled from the bong Cisco had built for him. 

Cisco didn’t indulge. He barely drank. Not because he wasn’t legal, but because he was high on the infinite knowledge suddenly at his fingertips. He took every kind of class that he could, even some of the liberal arts stuff that didn’t make much sense to him. He learned how to throw a pot, crochet, play badminton, basketball and chess, write bullshit essays that sounded good, and real ones that sounded better. 

And engineering. He took everything that they would let him and audited more. Everything. Chemical, electrical, civil, medical, aeronautics, materials science and for one crazed semester biological. He settled eventually into mechanical and spent long happy hours alone, building whatever he wanted. 

He could be happy in the sheer act of creation. For many years, it was really the only time he was happy. There were echoes of joy in watching shows with the other geeks and trading references while drinking too much caffeine. They were his people, of a sort, even he always felt a little mismatched. 

“That Cisco kid,” he once overheard on his way out of a party, “is he as smart as they say?” 

“Dude,” Sam laughed loose and easy, “he’s a fucking genius. Gonna rebuild the world one day. If he doesn’t burn it down first. Crazy as a shit house rat that one.” 

Cisco got a single room the next year. Roommates were a hassle. 

 

_ Bisexual Male  _ (Pretty Boy) 

 

His first boyfriend came around when Cisco took his single room. Prateek was slim and wide eyed and had the remains of a Punjabi accent that Cisco could listen to all night. Which was good because Prateek loved to talk. 

“I wanted to be a poet,” he explained on their first date. Cisco hadn’t known it was a date until Prateek paid for their food. “But you can’t eat words.” 

“Politicians seem to,” Cisco joked lamely and was gratified when Prateek laughed. 

They never touched in public. They only ever went to Cisco’s room. Prateek was twenty-five, working on his master’s degree. Cisco was nineteen and his undergraduate time was nearly up. He felt older and wiser than other nineteen year olds, but Prateek had really lived.  

“Such a pretty boy,” Prateek would say as he laid Cisco down on the thin mattress. “Such kind eyes.” 

And Cisco would melt underneath him as easy as butter. They dated for five months and Cisco had the outlines of plans. Shared graduate housing and long cram sessions probably wouldn’t do much for the average person, but to Cisco it sounded like heaven. 

“I met a woman,” Prateek told him two weeks before housing applications were due. “Her name is Sarah.” 

“Yeah?” Cisco looked up from his laptop. “Can I meet her?” 

“Yes, of course,” Prateek leaned in and kissed him for the last time. If Cisco had known it was the last, maybe he wouldn’t have pulled away so quickly. Maybe he would have done it faster. “I’m going to marry her. I want you to be my best man.” 

He didn’t know any better. Cisco agreed. He wore a rented tuxedo and sweated through a very traditional American ceremony. Prateek recited a poem to his beautiful blushing bride and told everyone that he was the happiest man alive. 

“I hate weddings,” one of the bridesmaids sat down next to Cisco at his table of sorrows. Her dress was creased and sweat stained. Her fancy hairdo was melting. “You look like you should get out of here. Want to go back to my place? It’s not far.” 

Her name was Vanessa and she had hair the color of fire. She liked to cook and she kept him fed through the summer. They wallowed in heartbreak and the sheets together.  Then September ran around and whisked her back to her own college across the country. She never gave him her number. 

It was strange to pick up the pieces of his broken heart and keep moving along. He had always thought it would be more dramatic to be so injured in love, but really it was just more of  the same dull pain that haunted him his whole life. 

 

_ Puerto Rican _ (Francisco) 

 

Cisco had accidentally been born in Puerto Rico. It couldn’t possibly have been his fault since he’d been a seven month old fetus at the time, but to hear of it from his mother it had been a willful act of defiance. The first time she had gotten to return home in years and he couldn’t wait two damn weeks to show up.  

There are pictures of him bundled up in his mother’s arms, a small Dante looking warily up at him.  The house behind them was painted mint green and their abuela and abuelo standing in the doorway. They looked like solid people with their greying hair and solemn eyes.

He had never been back. His grandparents eventually came to them for a week or two  here and there, but they were strangers to him. Their Spanish was so fast and fluid that even his mother did not catch everything. The language was slip-slipping through the generations.  

His abuela died when he was seven and her husband didn’t last long after that. 

“We named you after your grandfather,” his mother told him when the news reached them. “The first Francisco Ramon.” 

The name never fit right after that. Like all of his clothes that had been Dante’s first. All of his toys that had already been played with. Nothing was new.  He started refusing to answer to it. Because it was his name, he realized, he could do that. It was his first real taste of freedom. 

“Cisco,” his mother would sigh and roll her eyes to the Heavens. “I give you a beautiful name and you butcher it.” 

She tried to teach him now to make the food that had sustained her as a child. 

“I have no daughter, so you will have to do,” she would say often and soon he avoided the kitchen altogether. He didn’t want to play daughter.  

He did write down her empanada recipe though. It went with him everywhere until he had his own apartment. On quiet Friday nights, he would walk past the usual supermarket that he frequented and take the bus to Mi Tienda. He bought chorizo, herbs and his mother’s favorite flour. He probably could’ve bought them anywhere, but he liked to talk to the cashier in their shared tongue. He liked looking like everyone else for just a little while. 

The nature of the beast of modern America was that Cisco lived in two worlds. His beloved numbers came steeped in a history of exclusions and hate. Some of his professors went out of their way to tell him that he was exception. As if no other Hispanic student had ever learned their way around a textbook. 

“There are always people who mean well,” Prateek had said to him, early on. They were in bed, the streetlight a dull silver through the window. “The question is, do you have the energy to show them how to do it correctly or do you grit your teeth through it and think about intentions.” 

“I’m not good at gritting my teeth,” Cisco rolled onto his stomach. “What do you do?” 

“I laugh,” Prateek shrugged. “It’s easier to be the one laughing.” 

CIsco had taken that to heart. 

“Are you lost?” A professor asked him when he stepped into his first doctorate level class. 

“Industrial Designs of Experiments?” Cisco looked to his sheet then back up. 

“Um, yes. Sorry. I just...you look...very young.” 

A faint vibration tremored through him, but Cisco only smiled. 

“Not just an illusion. Too young to drink, but old enough to bend the rules of physics.” 

He got a few smiles in his direction. He sat next to the one that looked most genuine. 

“Carmen,” she introduced. 

“Cisco.” 

And if she eventually learned to say a few words in Spanish that weren’t fit for the world outside the bedroom that was a fine thing. 

 

_ Submissive  _ (Pet) 

 

“Say please,” Carmen held the tip of her rubber dick to his lips.  “Beg nicely.” 

“Please,” he groaned, his mouth watering, gagging for her already.  “Please I want to taste you.” 

“Do you?” She ran her hands through his hair, tugging hard and his eyes went cross. 

“Yes, please, I want to...” 

And she moved the strap on away and brought her pussy to his lips. It was smothering and glorious and he nearly came through the sheer act. It didn’t hurt that she reached behind her and started stroking his aching cock with a cotton gloved hand. 

Carmen had started on him slowly, but he learned quickly how much he loved to obey. It was a relief to make no more decisions. She wasn’t into pain or ropes. She just liked to boss him around and he went willingly. She gave him a safe word before he knew what one was and he would remember her forever like this. Even after he lost the details of her face, he would remember the taste of her choking him and beauty of her thighs on his cheeks. 

“Come on,” she coaxed and he flicked his tongue of her clit until she came with an aborted shout. 

“Can I come?” He asked, plaintive and wanting after she rolled away. 

“Do what you want,” she yawned and curled up. “I’ll watch.” 

She had a tendency to fail him in the end, but Cisco was willing to forgive it. 

When he asked her if she would order him around outside of the bedroom, she laughed. 

“You wouldn’t last a minute,” she kissed his forehead like he was a child. “Submission isn’t compliance.” 

They broke up in a screaming fight that was either about him fixing her car without permission or that she already had her eye on someone new. Cisco wasn’t sure. But she’d already given him what he needed. Even if he wasn’t sure how to ask for it. 

  
  


_ Adjunct  _  (Professor Ramon) 

 

“You’ve got a very strong CV, but not much in the way of recommendations,”  the Dean looked at him over the top of their glasses. “I don’t like rebels in my department, Mr. Ramon.” 

“Doctor,” he corrected softly. “I earned my degree last year. I’m not rebellious, I promise. I can play well with others.” 

“Can you?” the eyes disappeared back behind their glasses. “I’ll be honest, nothing on here suggests to me that you’re tenure material. But I do have a few classes that could use...” 

Cisco tuned the Dean out. He’d say yes to what was offered because he needed the money. Needed it more badly than he liked to admit even to himself.  The few extra dollars he had at the end of the month went to his small savings account to stave off future disaster. 

From the interview, he took the train back to Central City Community College. Fifty students waited for him in a worn out classroom, already weary from maintaining focus. He got to the board and started in on equations of friction. 

“Did you get the job, Cisco?” a young woman in the front piped up. 

“And leave you behind, Dani?” he kept his back to them, so they wouldn’t see his expression. “Never. Next year, maybe, if you can graduate on time.” 

There were a few sympathetic sounds. It was a classroom full of second attempts, second lives. They talked about job searches during their breaks and he offered his meager knowledge to them. Most of them had five years on him at least, some has many as twenty. Dani was forty-eight and she brought him jerk chicken sandwiches and milkshakes from her job for him to eat when the last student had trickled away. 

“You need the fat,” she’d tsk and change out the flavor of the shake every week to keep interesting. 

“Professor Ramon?” Hank returned after class, catching him on the last two bites of his sandwhich. 

“Yeah?” he asked around bread and char. Hank was a younger student. Still older than Cisco.  He was a small mountain of a man with a big bushy beard and a newsboy cap that had seen better days. Yet he managed to hover in a light way with some nervous question lingering behind his eyes.  “What’s up, Hank?” 

“When the semester is over, could I take you out for a drink?” 

“That’s not appro-” Cisco started then stopped. Because fuck it. He taught two classes here and Hank had specified after the grading period. “Okay.” 

“Really?” 

“Really.” 

It turned into a group thing, a bunch of his students treating him to beer and pizza. But Hank was the one that lingered after they were all gone and bought them another round when their glasses went dry. 

“Would you like to see a movie sometime?” He asked, instead of what Cisco had been sure was coming and was debating about accepting. 

“Yeah,” Cisco decided instantly. “That’d be cool.” 

They saw three movies. All of them decent. Hank was a gentleman. Cisco could already tell that they were an imperfect fit, almost too much alike. But he was lonely and tired and Hank was lively and had a really nice dog that never jumped up. The sex was okay. Cisco longed to scratch the itch that Carmen had laid under his skin, but Hank was attentive, if not rough and sweet, if not good at saying what Cisco need to hear. 

“You want to move in?” Hank offered when Cisco complained about his rent. 

They had been together seven months, Cisco’s longest relationship ever. But it wasn’t hard to say no and walk away without boyfriend or dog or cheap rent. 

There was a new set of students two weeks later. One of them looked like Hank. Cisco carefully treated him the same as anyone else. He missed Dani’s sandwiches more than Hank. He visited her at work sometimes, but it wasn’t the same. Students weren’t friends and colleges were no longer the refuge of knowledge they’d once been. 

“Professor?” A hand in the air. He called a name. 

His phone rang.  A ring he’d never thought to hear again. 

“Excuse me, class,” he grabbed it up and headed into the hall.The X-Files theme played on. “Hello?” 

“Dr. Ramon, this is Vivian Gretsky from Star Labs. We received your C.V. and we’d like you to come in for an interview.” 

He ducked his head back into the classroom. 

“Go home. Read a chapter...whatever. Maybe I’ll see you on Monday.” 

“Maybe?” Someone called out. He ignored them. 

“I can come in whenever you want me,” he said and he could hear Vivian smile through the line. 

“It’s not when _ I _ want you. I can give you a slot tomorrow at four.” 

He hung after calmly gathering details and then slid onto the floor, leaning against the wall. He had to nail the interview. 

“You okay, Professor Ramon?” Someone asked above him and it took everything in him not to correct them. 

He could introduce himself as Doctor Ramon tomorrow. Today, he was still a teacher who had to get off the ground and behave. 

  
  


_ Husband  _  (Gorgeous) 

 

Harrison had been edging him for a half an hour or a thousand years depending on who you asked. Tied down, blindfolded, nerve endings singing, Cisco was aware of every layer of his skin. Harrison had never once moved away or stopped touching him. 

“Ten more minutes,” Harrison was in his ear, his breath buzzing over Cisco’s neck. His hand left off stroking Cisco’s cock and he nearly wept. 

“Can’t,” he panted. “Please, I don’t think I can.” 

“I know you can,” Harrison kissed him. Because Harrison never ever gagged him. It had never even come up as a suggestion and Harrison had suggested a lot of things.  “You can do anything.” 

“Nuh uh, no.” Cisco tilted his head back, inviting the line of bites that followed. “Seriously. I’m done. Gonna die.”

He could feel Harrison’s smile, that wry twist that Cisco would never ever tire of kissing. 

“Even if it means that you don’t get fucked?” 

“That is mean and wrong,” Cisco thrust his hips the bare few inches he had the leverage for.  

“That is motivation,” Harrison laughed, dark and sweet and bitter as chocolate. 

He also did what he promised. Cisco bore the last five minutes of the tease and preparation. Harrison liked to take his time stretching him when they did things like this. More to prolong the agony than anything else and while Cisco’s mouth spew protest, his chest expanded with love and satisfaction. 

When Harrison finally undid some of the binding, enough for him to bend Cisco’s legs up and push inside of him, Cisco did leak some tears. No one had to know. The blindfold was designed to wick them away. 

He came hard enough that it bordered on pain, then lay complacent and happy as Harrison found his own release. 

The blindfold came away first, the sweep of the pad of Harrison’s thumbs over his eyelids to shoo away any stray eyelashes knocked loose. Then the bindings came undone, each reddened stripe of skin rubbed and kissed until Cisco was ready to melt into the sheets. 

“Up,” Harrison chided him. “Shower.” 

“Ugh,” Cisco flung his arm over his eyes, content to stay in the peaceful darkness. 

“C’mon, gorgeous,” Harrison tapped the center of his chest. “I promise I’ll let you lean all over me and whine.” 

“I don’t whine,” Cisco whined. 

“You do. Loudly. Nearly constantly. Lucky for you, I’ve gained a certain immunity,” strong fingers interwove with his own and a sharp tug got him to his feet. 

Cisco did lean all over him in the shower, but he was too fucked out to whine. Instead he watched Harrison wash them both with sleepy interest.  

“We’ve got to do that thing with the tech team tomorrow,” Cisco said through a yawn as Harrison ducked them back under the spray to sluice away the last of the mess. “Got the agenda ready and everything. Want me to email it to you?” 

“It’ll keep,” a kiss to his temple and Harrison’s arms sliding around him. Holding up both their weight for a little while. “Besides, I’m more interested in that bit of sonics work you’ve got on your desk.” 

“Not ready yet.” 

“As if I need the complete piece to guess where your gorgeous brain is going,”  Harrison rolled his eyes. “Idiot. I love you.” 

“Mmm,” Cisco tipped forward to rest his forehead on Harrison’s chest. “Love you too.” 

  
  


_ Superhero  _ (Penumbra) 

“Thank you,” she held onto his hands even as he tried to take a step backwards. There was makeup caked on her face, now a runny mess from tears. “Thank you so much.” 

“You’re welcome,” his voice modulated. “I have to go now.” 

“Oh, of course,” she let go and staggered back. “I should-” 

She couldn’t seem to finish the sentence. 

“Let me walk you to a safe place. You can call the cops from there,” he decided. 

_ There’s a restaurant on the corner,  _ Jesse said in his ear. She had the comms while Harrison met with the Board of Directors about their new charitable initiative to rehabilitate evil metahumans humanely. Mostly because trying to store them was a pain in the ass for both the labs and the city. Made more problems than it solved. 

“I know the place,” Cisco led the clinging woman down the broken sidewalk to the glowing promise of cheap food and saftey. He installed her in a booth, ordered her a hot meal and started unfolding cash onto the table. 

“No, thank you,” the waitress swept in and handed the bills back to him. “Your money is not good here. She’ll eat on us. You too if you want to take something home.” 

“Really, I don’t mind paying,” he hated the freebies. Once they would’ve meant the world to him, but there was a prenup that made him richer than he’d ever imagined (Harrison’s lawyers had not liked the prenup) and that was before the royalties from his patents figured into it. 

“You saved my son’s life,” she said firmly. 

“Oh,” he rarely remembered the victims. He lived for the high of the saving, and preferred to enjoy it with his own people. 

“Do you want anything?” She asked and it sounded more like a threat. 

“Um. Churro?” 

She loaded him down with five meals worth of amazing smelling Mexican. 

_ You better be bringing that back here,  _ Jesse hissed over the line.  _ I’m starving. _

“Message received, Fennec.” 

_ I hate that codename.  _ She groused. 

“You love it.” 

His bike was untouched thanks to the built in tasar alarm system he’d built in. Sometimes he didn’t feel like playing nice. The bike had been a gift from Dick and Tim, not easily replaceable in sentiment or raw speed. 

The food was still warm when he made it up to Jesse’s perch at the top of the Star Labs building. She had her own offices in another part of town these days and she’d moved out of the house, but somehow she was still in both places nearly all the time. Cisco didn’t ask, she didn’t say. 

That was mostly how it worked between them. 

“Penumbra offline and bearing some wicked good food.”

“I can see that,” she turned her chair around, the halo of her hair blown bright by the halogen on her desk. She’d cut it short as if with Cassie growing hers long, someone had to compensate. “Your damsel in distress cry when you left?” 

“Nah, she was already telling her story to some hack on the phone. It’ll be in one of the rags tomorrow.” 

“All hail, Penumbra,” she said, only half-sarcastically. 

“Ugh, eat your quesadillas.” 

They ate in office chairs, takeaway containers warming their laps and scanners beeping beside them. He wasn’t quite her friend, but he was in her life on a near daily basis and fucking her father...well. Things had slowed down to slightly less than daily over time, but still close enough. Between work and superheroing and general awesome, a man did run out of steam sometimes. 

Anyway, the thing with Jesse was that Cisco knew exactly what he was to her. But she had forbid him from ever actually identifying it and he got that. She didn’t want another parent, especially one who was barely three years older than her and to whom she might’ve had a wee bit of oppressed attraction.He handed her the vanilla soda he’d grabbed for her because she always got an itchy nose from too much spice if she didn’t wash it down with something. 

“Ready for your defense?” He asked putting his feet up on her desk. 

“No,” she grumbled. “There’s some questions from the ethics committee about one of my tests.” 

“I can help you draft a rebuttal. I think I speak fluid legalese after trying to untangle that meta-app mess.” 

“Thanks,” she tilted her soda at him. 

He was still wearing most of his costume, but he could feel Penumbra leeching away, back into the box he kept him in his head. Penumbra made him stronger, more wary and quicker, but he was no help at all when he wanted to chill out with the people he cared about. 

Superheroing was funny that way. Good for the world, bad for the soul. Dick had warned him about it and then Tim and then, in a weird roundabout way during their completely amazing and all too brief meeting, Superman himself. 

That had been so fucking cool. 

“Earth to Penumbra,” Jesse snapped her fingers at him. “You gonna drive us home or should I call a cab.” 

“Oh, I’m driving,” Cisco came back to himself. “As long as you’ve got your helmet.” 

“Yeah, I’m good, Dad.” She rolled her eyes the same way Harrison did. It was endearing and annoying. 

“Finish your damn quesadilla. I swear, I provide and kick ass and sass is the thanks I get.” 

She threw a napkin at him. He vibrated it into confetti, letting it float like snow around them. 

 

_ Son and Brother  _ (Conejito) 

 

“It was painless,”  Dante said dully, his elbows on his knees. 

Cisco sat down. On the floor. There was a quarter under the coffee table. He vaguely remembered his pockets turning out when he was looking for his keys the other day. 

“Heart attack.” He repeated. 

“Yeah.” 

“Okay....okay,” Cisco sipped in air. “Okay.” 

“It’s not,” Dante went back to signing, his voice probably threatening to betray him. “It’s not okay, conejito.” 

Harrison found him sitting in the kitchen a few hours later, paperwork and confusion laid out in front of him. 

“What happened?” 

“My father died.” It sounded dry. Clinical. 

“Ah,” Harrison slid into the chair next to him. Their knees touched, a single point of firm reality in his unmoored state.  “When is the funeral?” 

“I’m trying to figure that out. Apparently, his brother can’t get in for another three days, but they never talked so I don’t really know why that matters-" 

“Woah,” Harrison actually looked at the papers then. “Are you planning the funeral? And the wake?” 

“Mom is a mess,” he rubbed a hand over his eyes, “and Dante is too emotional to actually talk to anyone without blowing up their brains or the phone, so guess who wins the emotional labor lottery again?” 

“Nope,” Harrison gathered the papers. 

“What?” 

“No.” He repeated. “You aren’t going to have to do this.” 

“It’s my father. I can’t take my stand on this one, I can’t.” 

“You’re not. Look,” Harrison took Cisco’s hand between his own and rubbed a little. “I’ll take care of it.” 

“How? You can’t speak Spanish and my mother thinks you are the literal devil. Not even a little metaphorically. Last time I visited she asked me if I’d found your horns yet.” 

“What did you say?” 

“That you only had the one. She smacked me, but it was worth it.” 

They both laughed and Cisco found a sob at the end of his. 

“I don’t even know why I’m upset. He has spoken to me in years. I know you think my mom sucks, but at least she keeps trying. Dad just gave up on me.” 

“Grief doesn’t need reason,” Harrison bundled him up and Cisco wound up in his lap with his head on his favorite shoulder.  

Harrison was true to his word though Cisco suspected he mostly delegated out to confused employees of the Human Relations department. The funeral was...what it was. Good? Nice? People spoke and described a man that Cisco had never met. His mother cried silently. She wasn’t wearing any makeup or her contacts. He had forgotten how her eyes were so much lighter than his or Dante’s. 

His father’s eyes had been dark. Cisco wondered if he’d see him in the mirror now or if the thought would fade with time.  Dante stood to his left, flanked by Jesse and Cassie. Neither of the girls did more than school their faces in mirrors of Harrison’s solemn expression. It was a good funeral expression. Too bad it was just Harrison’s everyday expression when he was bored out of his skull. 

“Dust to dust,” the priest intoned and Cisco wanted to go home more than anything. 

He couldn’t, of course. He had to comfort his mother, who would reach over him for Dante. He had to be there for his brother, who would probably retreat into himself and be unable to greet guests. He had to be there because that’s what you did. That’s what Cisco did. 

For everyone. 

“We’re going,” Harrison had a hand at the small of his back as the crowd broke up. 

“What? No,” Cisco started to turn back. 

But his mother was being gently spoken to by Cassie and Jesse was already playing hostess with her usual frosty aplomb. His relatives looked bemused, but willing to be led. Wells were good at that.  

“Yes,” Harrison ushered him past and no one stopped them. 

Of course they didn’t. It would always hurt, but today....he was actually okay with it. There was a car waiting for them and they climbed inside. Cisco looked for words, but nothing came to him. 

“When my mother died, I knew it was coming,” Harrison’s eyes were on the window. He never made eye contact when he was discussing his parents. A fact that Cisco had studiously never pursued. “She’d been dying all my life.” 

“Yeah,” Cisco said softly. 

“I never knew what to do with that,” Harrison turned back to him. “So you don’t have to know now how to deal with it.” 

“I’m not good with uncertainty.” 

“I’ve noticed,” Harrison pulled him close. “You’ll figure it out.” 

Dante called him in the middle of the night. Cisco was awake because he was always awake until two or three am. 

“You left,” it was laced not with accusation, but confusion. 

“You didn’t need me.” 

“Don’t be stupid, conejito. We always need you.” 

“When?” He demanded, setting aside his pen so he didn’t accidentally explode ink everywhere. 

“You’re our good heart. Even Dad used to say that.” 

“Not to me,” Cisco’s breath hitched, threatening tears again and he fought them back. “He never had a good word for me, D. Not once.” 

“I know. I’m sorry, but you have to believe that he felt it.” 

“Do I?” 

“No. I guess you don’t.” 

His mother didn’t get to him for another month. She didn’t call though. 

“Dr. Ramon?”  The new secretary popped her head around the lab door. 

“If it’s supplies, tell them that yes, I do actually need all five grams of the plutonium and no, they can’t play with it first that’s how we get radioactive ants. No one wants that again.” 

“It’s your mother.” 

“She called here?” 

“I am here.” 

It was one of the most bone chilling moments of his life. And Cisco had stared down a metahuman who could literally shatter bone with ice. 

“Mama,” he got to his feet. “What are you doing here?” 

“I came to talk to you,” she frowned as she looked around and Cisco felt about three. 

“You’ve never come here before,” he tucked his hands behind his back. 

“You never invited me.” 

“You never asked.” 

They stalemated. She looked like herself. He wasn’t sure what he expected, but she had herself together and clear eyed. It had been a month, she must’ve already started adjusting. 

“It’s nice,” she gestured vaguely at the whole lab. It was steel and glass and stood at the top of the finest institution in the country if not the world. 

“Yeah, Mama.” 

“You never needed me,” she said all at once. 

“Sorry?” 

“You didn’t. You were so....so....bright. You started making sandwiches for your own lunch when you were two. You taught yourself how to read and you hated being read to. You...ha...you told me it was okay to leave you home alone when I needed to get Dante to practice. You were four.” 

“Was I?” 

“Yes.” 

And of course, she’d taken it up on him. He didn’t remember it, but it figured.  

“What do you want?” He asked warily. 

“I want you to come to dinner on Friday,” she blinked once slowly. “Bring your doctor.” 

“Husband. He’s my husband, Mama.” 

“I know,” her eyes went to his ring as if magnetized. “Does he take good care of you?” 

“Yeah,” he said roughly. “Yeah, he does.” 

“Then he can come. Dante is bringing his...harem,” she sniffed. “At least you stayed to one. And have a good excuse for not giving me a grandchild.” 

It was the nicest thing she had ever said to him. It was horrible and awful and he hugged her for it because you had to reward the little things.  

“You’re coming to dinner with Dante, Cassie and Jesse and me at my mom’s house on Friday.” 

“When I said you would figure out a way to deal with your grief, I didn’t inflicting pain on me,” Harrison said. 

But he went.

Cisco could’ve done without the screaming argument, but that actually made it feel a little more homey. His mother kissed his cheek when they left and gave Dante a chilly glare. It was surreal and actually sort of nice in a terrible way. 

“Good night, conejito,” she pat his shoulder. “Good night, terrible man.” 

“Good night, Mrs. Ramon,” Harrison said stiffly. 

Later, the inevitable question came. 

“What was she calling you? I never heard anyone say that before, but lately Dante’s been dropping it every ten minutes.” 

“It’s terrible and you will laugh.” 

“Probably,” Harrison danced fingers over his ribs. “Tell me anyway.” 

“It was what my Dad used to call me when I was really little. Guess it stuck a bit here and there,” he sighed. “It means ‘little rabbit’.” 

“No,” Harrison said with a growing smile. 

“Yes,” Cisco sighed. 

“Of course, it does. You knew that and you still called me Fox?” 

“Yeah, yeah,” Cisco captured Harrison’s hand, their rings brushing together. “You devour me on the regular, so I think it’s still a good name.” 

“All your names are good.”

  
Maybe they were. Maybe they weren’t, but they belonged to him. And they helped him lay claim to the people that spoke them. He need them all. Even his Mama. Even his Papa. Cisco didn't cry anymore about it, but he let himself feel it the emptiness where he thought sadness should be. Maybe one day, he could even forgive. He was good at forgiveness.   



	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Whoops! Sorry guys, accidentally posted this one to the wrong story at first. 
> 
> This is a bit of Wally/Dick pre-slash for Aslee with a bit of Penumbra to lead us in.

“Come in, Penumbra,” the line crackled to life even though Cisco was hours away from suiting up. The voice wasn’t one of his usual handlers either. Those he knew too intimately to mistake. 

“Penumbra on line,” he started saving the work he had on his desktop. “Hello, Robin.” 

“Sorry to break in, but you left such a neat little backdoor for me, I had to use it at least once.” 

“You liked? Good. What’s up?” 

“We’ve got a speedster.” 

“Really?” Cisco sat up straight. “Where? When? How?” 

“No idea. I don’t think the poor speedster does either. We only picked them up because they slingshotted around Gotham twice and ruffled the wrong feathers. Oracle is ready to spit. Think the abilities manifested spontaneously and now the poor person can’t stop. We slowed down one recording and you can hear them screaming.” 

“Ah,” Cisco sent a quick set of texts to Jesse, alerting her to his change of plans. Harrison would kill him before he even got to the suit if he knew what he up to. “So you need me to apply the brakes.” 

“Please,” Robin groaned. “Nightwing has a rudimentary communication going with flashing lights from the batplane. He’s stirring him to an open area not far from you. Can you be there in ten?” 

“Send the address. I’m already on my way.” 

Robin faded out and Jesse slammed in. 

“You’re going against a speedster?” 

“They aren’t looking for a fight, just someone to help them stop,” he explained as he got in the elevator. He got off at sub-basement and was half into the suit before she was done chewing him out. 

“...and then he’ll kill both of us.” 

“I’ll take the blame. Just watch the monitors for me, okay? I don’t want to go in there alone.” 

“Thought you were just the brakes?” she said tense and sharp as knives. 

“Yeah, well. Sometimes the brakes get ground down.” 

He ran a hand over his hair, tips of his fingers ticking over the spine of his braid. The plait looked a little feminine, but it kept the hair out of his eyes more effectively. Harrison had done it once as a sort of joking punishment after Cisco had taken a punch that could’ve been avoided if his hair wasn’t in his face. Cisco had liked it so much it was part of their morning routine now. He refused to learn how, wanting desperately the early morning affection and ownership of beloved hands reining him in. And it gave Harrison something constructive to do for his safety, instead of obsessing.

Mutual crazy was the best kind. 

The bike thrummed to life and Robin came through with an address. Cisco saved his breath and didn’t try to talk over the noise. It wasn’t often he went out in daylight and he was still a little tickled that people saw him and tried to wave before he sped past. His press was good, if low-key thanks to Jesse. A friendly ghost of a hero, who hadn’t yet attracted the really big fish villains that fucked up everyone’s day. 

The rendezvous was an abandoned airfield about a mile out from anything that mattered. Central City was weird like that. Dense and then farmland far as the eye could see. Cisco had only parked and started to get the lay of the land when Robin came back over the line, 

“They’re about fifty seconds out.” 

“Right,” Cisco got into position, trying to be as visible as possible while also leaving himself some cover if things went bad. 

“I hate this, for the record,” Jesse cut in. 

“Noted,” he flexed his knees and scanned the horizon. The red crackle creased the air. “Incoming!” 

It wasn’t hard. The speedster was clearly trying to slow and Cisco had practice with this. He found the right vibration and caught the blur easy. The speedster stopped and fell to their knees. 

“Got them,” Cisco relayed and walked over. “Hey, you okay?” 

He offered his hand, wiggling the fingertips when the poor guy just stared at him. 

~*~ 

Wally West had had a bitch of a day. It had started badly with sleeping through an alarm, a headache that wouldn’t quit and then he’d made the mistake of stepping between an angry kid with a baseball bat and the other kid he’d been beating to a pulp with it. 

He’d started running, once he was sure the victim was alright and doubly sure that that kid with the bat meant business. 

And then things had gotten out of hand. 

The world had blurred by, fast, fast and faster. He left the kid with his bat in the dust and then all of Central City. It would have been amazing if he hadn’t been so damn scared. 

And he was down on his ass in front of some kind of biker- 

“Holy shit,” he blinked up at the extended hand. “You’re Penumbra.” 

“That’s me,” the fingers waggled at him, “standing is the new sitting, buddy.” 

“Thanks,” he took the hand and he was surprised by force that set him on his feet. And that he was at least six inches taller than Central City’s quietest hero. “Um, I’m Wally.” 

“Hi, Wally. So...speedster?” 

“Apparently?” He stared down at his feet. “Do you think it’s safe for me to move?” 

“I have no idea, but I can stop you if you start blurring. Sort of a specialty. And you get to test it now because we’re in his way.” 

“Whose way?” 

“His!” Penumbra grabbed his arm and dragged Wally out of the clear patch of brush and into the heavier grass.

A delicate, matte black jet slipped almost soundlessly to the ground where they had been. The hatch went up and a man in slick suit vaulted out. A large blue bird spread its wings over his chest. He had thick black hair and the strongest jawline Wally had ever seen. 

“So?” the man strode over and he was the height that Wally expected from a hero. Penumbra crossed his arms over his chest. 

“Dude, not cool. You almost smushed the new guy.” 

“I did not. You’re okay, right new guy?” A brilliant smile flashed at Wally, nearly blinding him. 

“Uh. Sort of? I think I burned my shoes off.” 

“Yeah, speedsters can’t get by with Nikes. I’m Nightwing, by the way,” he held out a hand and it was a strange feeling to shake a gloved hand. “You clocked about seven hundred miles an hour at one point.” 

“Really? It all sort of terror-blurred together after awhile.” 

“We’ll figure out how to get you better at braking,” Nightwing clapped him on the shoulder. “What do you normally do, Wally?” 

“I’m a mechanic. Mostly mod work. I’ve always been into speed, I guess,” he found a laugh under his confusion. “Fate intervening?” 

“You’d be surprised how often that happens,” Penumbra muttered. Then froze. “Heeeeey, Silver Fox.” 

“Oh, shit,” Nightwing covered his mouth to smother a laugh. “Walk a little with me.” 

“Who’s Silver Fox?” 

“Penumbra’s keeper. And he’s got a thing about speedsters. You two probably shouldn’t meet for awhile.” 

“Zoom,” Wally said with all the fear he’d carried with him as soon as his feet had taken off without his permission. 

“Zoom,” Nightwing agreed. “Look, he was...corrupt. Probably long before he figured out what he could do. Power makes people into extremes, you know? You a good guy, Wally?” 

“I don’t know,” he admitted. “I used to...it’s public record. I was a drag racer for a long time. Made a lot of my money that way. Got caught.” 

“Drag racing,” Nightwing’s lip twitched. “Okay...and?” 

“And what?” 

“Well, I’ve got a little bird in my ear,” Nightwing paused. “Sorry. He’s informing that he’s a big ole grown up bird. Ruffled his wee feathers. But he’s got your records. Says that you got out of racing after a two month stint in lock up. Since then, you’ve done three times the amount of community service asked of you, became part-owner in a local garage and used most of your pretty substantial profits to help expand the community center in the neighborhood you grew up in.” 

“Your little bird is pretty damn nosy.” 

“You have no idea,” the laugh was a little rueful. “Anyway, sounds like you’re a stand up citizen.” 

“That’s what I do, not what I am.” 

“I am so boned,” Penumbra groused, stalking up to them. “I’ve got to get back to base and deal with some serious fall out. Wally, been a pleasure. You need me, you call.” 

A card, jet black, slid from his sleeve and he offered it to him. 

“There a number on here?” He turned the thing over and over. 

“It’s a literal calling card,” Penumbra actually bounced a little. “Snap it in half and it’ll send out an alert to me.” 

“You’re sort of....different. Then I thought.” 

“If you’re gonna be one of us,” Penumbra gestured between him and Nightwing, “ditch the idea of whatever you used to think we were. We’re just a bunch of fuck ups in tight clothes. Some of us tighter than others.” 

“Hey!” Nightwing reached over and flicked a finger at Penumbra’s visor. It made an oddly dull thudding noise. “Don’t be jealous of my awesome bod.” 

“Bats,” Penumbra turned to Wally as if in commiseration, “are all egomaniacs with fantastic bodies. It’d be unfair to the rest of us, but seriously, the gym time? Makes my gut hurt just thinking about it.” 

“Not all of us come pre-cooked with wacky powers,” Nightwing groused. “And I can still kick your ass.” 

“We’ll see about that next time you bother to visit.” 

“Ugh, fine. I’ll RSVP, but you gotta promise to give me a dance.” 

“No fucking way, puta,” Penumbra laughed. “I’m in enough trouble with the Fox.” 

It clicked with Wally finally and he pointed. 

“You’re Hispanic!” 

“Uh, you’re black?” Penumbra shoulders stiffened. “You going somewhere with this?” 

“No, I mean...just, none of them are, are they?” Wally gestured at Nightwing, who didn’t seem to have a retort. “All the supers, they’re white. I mean even Superman and he’s an alien.” 

“Well there’s...” Penumbra trailed off. “There are a few. Lesser known, I guess.” 

“Figures,” Wally kept staring at him. “Man, you have got to take that helmet off once and awhile. There are a lot of kids that would mean a hell of a lot to.”

“I like my ass in one piece,” Penumbra said, warming back up. “Fox isn’t big on exposure. But I think I know what you mean. I'll figure something out.” 

Nightwing’s hand landed on Wally’s shoulder again and this time it didn’t leave. 

“You’re gonna be okay, kid.” 

“I’m not a kid,” Wally said fiercely. “I’m twenty-four.” 

“Yeah?” Nightwing grinned. “Awesome. That means I get you instead of the teeny weenies tit-OW!” 

“What just happened?” Wally watched Nightwing drop to his knees. 

“That would be Robin, letting his big brother know that he shouldn't make fun of his team,” Penumbra shook his head. “You’re too old for the Titans. Technically, Nightwing doesn’t have a team at the moment, but he tends to form them by accident all the time.” 

“Uh huh. Any of this actually make sense at any point?” 

“Not really. Why I stay solo...sort of. Speaking of, I was going. Going quickly,” Penumbra held out his hand. “Hope to see you around soon. And if you’re thinking of a name...well. This town could use a Flash around again.” 

He wanted to protest, but Penumbra was already walking away and talking a mile a minute to the voice only he could hear. 

“Yeah, I’m coming in. No...no...oh come on! I wasn’t- no. No....really? That doesn’t sound like a punish-oh. Oh.” 

“Don’t ask,” Nightwing muttered, apparently recovered from his sudden collapse. “Because he’ll tell you and then you’ll wish you didn’t know.” 

“Sex stuff?” Wally guessed. 

“All of the stuff,” Nightwing agreed. “I walked in on it once. Well, I say walked. Fell through a window. But you know.” 

“I really really don’t,” Wally protested. 

They watched Penumbra get on his bike and speed off which left Wally with a big question. 

“How the hell am I supposed to get home?” 

“You want a lift?” Nightwing gestured at the plane. 

“Don’t think that’s going to land on the roof of my building without someone noticing.” 

“I was thinking a lift to Gotham, actually. Can you take a few days off work? At the very least, we can get you figured out so you don’t wind up in Mumbai because you broke into a jog to catch an ice cream truck.” 

“Oh,” Wally considered his options. “Yeah. I guess that’d be for the best.” 

He made his phone calls while Nightwing ran through the jet’s systems. He started with work and ended with Iris. He never knew how to lie to her, so he just told her the whole truth. Nightwing didn’t try to stop him, so he figured that was all right. 

“Be safe,” she pleaded. 

“I think I’m in good hands,” he assured her. 

“The best,” Nightwing wiggled his fingers at him. 

“On the wheel!” Wally barked as the jet took a noticeable downward turn. 

“Wally?” Iris asked, panic rising in her voice. 

“I’m fine,” he reassured her. “Actually, this all feels kind of familiar. Like being back in college, but with better toys.” 

“Best toys,” Nightwing cut in. “Wait until you see my bat cave.” 

“I got to go, Iris. I think it’s flirting with me. Tell Barry not to blow anything up while I’m gone.” 

He hung up the phone to find Nightwing pouting at him. 

“I’m an it now?” 

“Oh God,” Wally sunk down his seat. “How long is this flight?” 

A third voice laughed over the speaker. 

“The Nightwing charm strikes again,” it was a young voice, too young to be associated with the sleek jet. 

“Robin?” He guessed. 

“That’s me. I’m looking forward to meeting you, Wally,” a little too somber and formal. “Don’t let Nightwing chase you off.” 

“Too late for that,” Wally side-eyed Nightwing. Despite his antics, he looked solid behind the jet’s controls. When he wasn’t smiling, there were obvious worry lines carved around his mouth. Wally would bet there were ones around his eyes’ under the mask to match. “He already caught me.” 

“Is that so?” Nightwing glanced at him, his eyes well shadowed. Protected. But his voice gave him away, the thread of hope among the forced humor. 

“Might be,” Wally leaned back in his seat and watched a new world unfold beneath him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the last of requests that I can recall off hand. I'd be happy to do more for this 'verse as I only have one stray idea left of my own for it. Leave them in the comments, if you've got them or stick 'em in my ask over tumblr (dragonmuse).


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pet Names gets a pet. For believesinponds, some fluff about a fluff to the best of Harrison's ability.

He was ready to call it a night when he heard the pained cry. Turning back in the alley way, he half expected to find a baby wailing away. To his immense relief, there was no infant in sight. When he found the source of the noise, he crouched down beside the cardboard box and found a pair of bright blue eyes staring back at him. 

“Hello,” he held out a hand, letting the little thing sniff his fingers. The kitten was entirely black, even it’s wiggling nose. It weren’t for the eyes gleaming in the dark, Cisco wasn’t sure he would’ve spotted it at all. “This isn’t a great spot for little types. I think you’d better ride with me.” 

With care, he extricated the kitten from the box. It hunkered down small and piteous in his grip, shivering violently. Unzipping his coat, Cisco made a pocket for his new passenger. 

“Please, don’t claw the shit out of me,” he murmured. The kitten mewed. It smelled godawful. The shirt and the jacket were going to need some serious laundering. 

His bike growled to life, covering any further sounds from his passenger. 

“Penumbra, checking in. Homeward bound, Silver Fox.” 

“Acknowledged,” Harrison said distractedly. He was probably multitasking again. “Fennec, Sonic and Tails are here too. They’re making something for dinner, so don’t stop off.” 

“Got it. You gonna eat with us?” 

“Yes, I’ll see you at the table.” 

The tunnel that Penumbra disappeared into after a long shift had a few blind passages and two doorways that only responded to certain frequencies he could generate. One led up to a private elevator at the Labs, the other to an old sewer line that left off in the woods behind the Wells’ manor. It had been a bitch and a half to manage all of that without proper documentation, but it was worth it to only have to stumble a few feet to the back door after a long night of crime fighting. 

Especially when you had a tiny angry passenger, who was recalling the use of claws. Cisco shed the bulk of his costume underground, turning the bottom of his t-shirt into a temporary kitten sling. Then he followed the light home. 

A rampant clatter greeted him. Dante and Cassie were taking turns at the stove, stirring paella while Jesse made a salad that seemed to contain nearly everything in the fridge. 

“Hey,” Cisco acknowledged them from the door. “You know for someone who doesn’t live here, you make us an awful lot of food.” 

“Starvation isn’t an option,” she tossed a piece of carrot at him. It pinged off his forehead.   
Using their distraction to his advantage, Cisco snuck off to the bedroom. He changed into jeans and a t-shirt, then dumped the kitten into the bathtub. 

“Neither of us is going to enjoy this, but trust me, if I don’t do it, you’ll be out on your furry ass. You smell like dumpster.” 

“Mew,” said the kitten indignantly. 

Cisco turned on the water. The kitten turned on the fury. The battle raged over the slick marble as Cisco scrubbed away what seemed like a pound of dirt. Underneath, the kitten was even smaller and more fragile than he originally suspected. It looked utterly pitiful once doused, bedraggled and thin as a rail. The towel helped to soothe hurt feelings, the rubbing apparently desirable against cold skin. 

When he was finished, it looked a lot more presentable. A becoming pile of black fluff that smelled faintly of mint instead of garbage. There’d been no show of fleas either, thank the merciful saints. 

“Right. Ready to meet everyone?” 

The kitten was still shivering a little, so Cisco put on one of Harrison’s (in name only considering how often they were borrowed) sweaters. Holding the kitten close to the warm fabric help. The pinprick of kneading claws he could’ve done without. 

The kitchen had emptied out by the time he got downstairs, everyone had gathered into the dining room. Harrison was at the head of the table, a journal open next to his plate. 

“Hey,” Cisco leaned in and brushed a kiss over his cheek. 

“They published the Higgs-Boson results,” Harrison said, hand reaching out to rub a lazy circle over Cisco’s lower back. 

“Yeah? Cool,” he leaned in to take a closer look at the article, forgetting his small burden. 

“Cisco...” Harrison said very, very quietly. 

“Mm?” 

“What is touching my face right now?” 

Cisco looked down. The kitten had reached out a paw and pressed it against the side of Harrison’s nose. 

“Uh...” 

“Kitten!” Cassie squealed, disrupting the conversation on her side of the table. 

“Kitten?” Jesse’s head whipped around. 

“For fuck’s sake,” Dante signed. 

“I found it in an alley,” Cisco held out the bundle of fur. 

“Poor thing,” Cassie scooped it up and brought it to eye level. “Someone just left you there?” 

“Here,” Jessie speared a piece of sausage out of the bowl of paella and held out it out to the kitten. It disappeared into a needle sharp mouth. 

“You brought home a victim,” Harrison said mildly. “I thought we agreed you wouldn’t do that.” 

“I didn’t rescue it from a mugger,” Cisco shrugged. “It’s just a kitten.” 

“Kittens become cats,” Harrison pointed out. 

“I agree with the observation, not sure what your conclusion is.”

“Cisco.” 

“Harrison.” He repeated in the same flat tone. 

“Hey!” Cassie protested. The kitten had escaped her hold and stalked down the table. It plonked itself in front of Harrison’s plate, tiny tail shifting slowly back and forth. 

“Yes?” Harrison addressed it. “May I help you?” 

The kitten tilted its head to one side. Harrison lifted an eyebrow. Everyone had gone quiet and still. The stand off lasted for only a few seconds, but seemed to drag on forever. Two sets of blue eyes and dark hair. A phone whipped out and clicked quietly. Both cat and person turned as one to stare at Jesse. 

“That’s going on the Sky Labs Instagram.” 

“Jesse,” Harrison said with all the fatigue in the world. 

“Mew,” said the kitten, stalking around the plate. It tested it’s balance and then leaped neatly onto Harrison’s shoulder. 

“No,” Harrison said firmly. 

“Mew,” said the kitten. 

“Cats always know,” he muttered darkly, then turned his attention back to his journal as if he could ignore the kitten out of existence. 

Cisco very quietly eased into his seat and held out his empty plate beseechingly to Jesse, who filled it wordlessly. Conversation slowly returned, the noise level rising. Harrison kept his attention low, eating absently. Occasionally, he’d side eye the kitten, but it only went on observing the table from it’s perch, showing no interest in moving. 

“We should name it,” Cassie decided. 

“Sombra,” Dante suggested with a twitch of a smile. 

“You’re not naming a black cat ‘shadow’,” Cassie rolled her eyes. “What are you, five?” 

“Shadows seem to like Daddy,” Jesse pointed out.

Cisco didn’t say a word. He ate his dinner, drank his Gatorade and kept an eye on the fellowship developing at his elbow. He hadn’t really thought they’d keep the kitten. It had been more of a faint hope, a remnant from a childhood spent hoping for a furry companion. He had imagined he’d just bring it home, they’d get it cleaned up and fed then find it a home. 

That was before Harrison absently reached up and started running a single finger over the kitten’s head, it’s eyes closing in bliss. 

“Higgs,” Cisco said quietly. “I like Higgs.” 

Harrison finally looked up, the faintest hint of a smile on his lips. 

“So do I.” 

The vet informed them that Higgs was a girl, a week or so too young to be separated from her mother. Harrison took diligent notes while Cisco used a laser pointer to keep Higgs from scratching the vet to shreds. 

Higgs liked the expensive pet food Harrison bought her as well as anything Cisco was considering putting in his mouth, preferably before he could get there, but fallen crumbs were also acceptable. She spent most of her time, attempting to scale Harrison so she could retain her shoulder perch. She never really outgrew it, her early weeks apparently having repercussions on her growth. 

“Who’s this adorable wittle girl,” a visiting biologist cooed when Harrison forgot to scoop Higgs off his shoulder before entering the boardroom. 

“That’s Higgs,” the senior VP of marketing whisper-hissed at the biologist. “If you want to keep your face intact, take three steps backwards and don’t make eye contact.” 

“But-” 

“Trust me, doctor,” Harrison pulled up his presentation and ignored his furry appendage. “It’s best to heed any warnings received by Star Labs personnel.” 

Higgs spent her nights stalking through the house, only occasionally settling in her bed in their room. She never tried to get into bed with them, apparently annoyed by their refusal to be coma still for her. 

“So how do you feel about having a pet now?” Cisco asked years later. Higgs was spread across Harrison’s lap, purring loudly as he stroked a finger over her head. 

“It’s heartbreak waiting to happen,” Harrison shrugged. “But I suppose the rewards are worth it.” 

“Mew,” said Higgs, rolling onto her back, so Harrison would rub her stomach. 

“Yeah,” Cisco hooked his chin over Higg’s favorite shoulder and stared down at her. “I think so too.”


	8. The Honeymoon, Part One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The first two days of the honeymoon. First they make love and then they do things their way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter contains depictions of BDSM. Not sure when I'll do part two, but I know there is more porn to come (pun intentional).

Despite the sweltering heat, gritty sand and lack of any kind of decent wi-fi signal, Harrison found himself enjoying Martinique. It might’ve been because Cisco spent the first twenty-four hours of their honeymoon entirely naked. The suite had a private pool and Cisco had taken flagrant advantage, spreading out in the sun without a hint of shame.

“It’s so warm,” he’d practically purred when they arrived, stepping out onto the wooden porch and already shedding layers. “It’s fantastic.”

 “I’m going to go put on sunscreen,” Harrison retreated temporarily and returned with a book, a thick t-shirt and shorts on. Reluctantly, he even stuffed a Star Labs baseball cap on, shielding his face from the worst of it.

Cisco was in the pool, floating under the fierce rays as if he were powering himself on them. His face was utterly serene. Harrison sat down with his book and didn’t flip a page for the better part of an hour. When he apparently reached his limit, Cisco emerged from the pool with water cascading down from his hair over the strong line of his back and the firm rise of his ass. Damp footprints trailed across the deck, an idle line to the deck chair next to Harrison. With a contented groan, Cisco flopped onto the chair and stretched out on his stomach. He smiled at Harrison, closed his eyes and fell into an instant deep sleep.

“Unfair,” Harrison informed the seabird that eyed him from a railing.   

The book finally caught Harrison’s attention and he read, carefully reapplying sunscreen and drinking copious amounts of water as needed. The temperature was dropping to something like bearable when Cisco woke up, turned onto his side and scratched his fingers through his dark pubic hair.

“Any good?”

“Do you care?” Harrison tossed the thing onto the deck and reaching out to pull Cisco’s chair until it abutted his own.  

“Well, I did,” Cisco laughed. “Now, not so much.”

His laughter tasted like chlorine and sweat, his hands fantastically warm as they reached out to embrace. Harrison rutted against him, too lazy from the heat to initiate more than a slide of skin on skin. Cisco offered no protest, stroking his hands down Harrison’s back over and over again, rubbing the last of the flight’s tension out of his spine.  The orgasm was more of a continuation of the massage then anything else and Cisco sank in a boneless hum afterwards, still a little drowsy around the eyes.

“You feel good,” he recovered Harrison’s baseball cap, lost in the fray. “stay right there.”

So Harrison lay down beside him and to his surprise, he managed to sleep a little in the sun.

Sunset found them showered and still not dressed. Cisco had found some strange telenova and he amused himself by mistranslating it for Harrison.

“She had her sister’s baby,” he said confidently. “And it’s part cat.”

“That would explain the slapping,” Harrison tried not give away how much the attempt was amusing him, but was clearly losing judging by Cisco’s gleeful expression.  “Do you want dinner? 

“Can we order in?” Cisco didn’t look away from the television, folded into a wicker chair. The doors were open to the ocean, a sweet breeze infiltrating the room.  

Harrison ordered them both a ridiculously rich meal. They ate looking out over the water, the television still babbling softly behind them.

“Thank you,” Cisco said as the moon launched itself up over the water. “This is...it’s amazing.”

“We haven’t even left the room,” Harrison pointed out.

“Some of the best parts of our relationship are us staying in one room for extended periods of time,” Cisco collapses backwards, his head in Harrison’s lap and his best smile aimed upwards. “We’re good in rooms.”

“So we are.”

“I noticed that you were a little possessive of your carry on,” Cisco went on. One of his hands started finger walking over Harrison’s arm. “Did you bring some of our things with you?”

“Might have,” he allowed. “Something old, something new, something blue.”

“Nothing borrowed?”

“Who would you suggest I borrow a sex accessory from?” Harrison lifted his eyebrows. “That seems unsanitary." 

“Fair enough.”

“Anyway, we don’t need those tonight.”

“We don’t,” Cisco tilted up his chin. “You saying you only had the one in you?”

“I’m saying that I would prefer to make you come the way I did that first night,” Harrison finally dropped a hand onto Cisco’s chest, rubbing in slow circles over the bare chest and abdomen, watching muscles jump and twitch. “Watch you ride me until you can’t take it a second longer.”

“Yeah,” Cisco arched his hips up. “That sounds perfect.”

The lubricant was a better brand, slicker and less sticky. They knew each other’s bodies far better now. The soft sound of Cisco’s lips parting as Harrison’s fingers pressed in and the whining keen when they withdrew were no longer revelations, but lines of a beloved song, well memorized.

Instead of a shitty apartment, they had a tropical breeze and butter soft sheets. Cisco didn’t blush or hesitate as sank down Harrison’s cock, but he did still let his eyes fall half-shut. He wasn’t surprised by Harrison’s metronome rhythm, but he had learned how to counter it with his own messy downward thrusts that never failed to throw Harrison off into a tangle of pleasures.

There was nothing of shyness or unsurety, only the divine exercise of bringing each other to the edge and toppling over it. Harrison knew enough of Cisco’s signs to come with him instead of minutes later.

“Goddamn,” Cisco caught himself on his elbows, for a moment only a shadow of black hair and heaving shoulders over Harrison’s stomach. Harrison rubbed possessive hands everywhere he could reach, greedy for it until Cisco collapsed over him entirely.  “Good as the first time?”

“Better,” Harrison decided. “Much, much better.”

They always moved apart in their sleep, Cisco eventually rolling onto his stomach and Harrison to his back. Harrison would wake up far before Cisco and get up to avoid waking him. At home, it was a practical matter.

But Cisco had a long nap the day before and he woke with the sun, blinking and yawning before Harrison snuck away. He rolled over, effectively pinning Harrison’s right arm to the bed.

“Coffee,” he demanded without fully opening his eyes.

“No,” Harrison said, just to see what would happen.

“Then no one is getting out of this bed,” Cisco determined. “Until coffee happens.”

The sun rose and they watched it without getting up. Cisco ran on foot over Harrison’s shin. Boats flocked onto the water, gleaming white spots in a field of jewel blue.

“I didn’t think you were actually capable of being still this long,” Cisco said eventually. “With nothing to do I mean.”

“I am doing something.” 

“What’s that?”

“Planning,” Harrison tucked a lock of hair behind Cisco’s ear.

“Oh,” Cisco scooted closer. “That sounds like it might be good for me.”

“Mmm. You know we have an outdoor shower?” 

“I saw it,” he could feel Cisco’s smile on his skin.

“That let me propose this,” he trailed his hand over the sensitive skin of Cisco’s neck, traced the curve of his shoulder and the line of his bicep. “You get to come twice today. Once in that shower at the time of your choosing though it must be before dinner. The second, when I choose and I can promise it will be significantly after sunset.” 

“That’s....yeah. I think that sounds like a plan. You gonna give me any hints?”

“No,” Harrison kissed his forehead. “I’m to go for a swim now before I’m risking my hide. Coming with?”

The pool wasn’t large enough to do more than a few strokes, but there would be other days to attempt the ocean for an actual workout. This morning was for sitting on the pool’s steps, Cisco on the step below while  pickling in chlorine and drinking iced coffee. The heavy heat snuck up slowly, creeping over the sand to soak into the wooden decking.  

Eventually, Harrison had to retreat to the shade and watch  as Cisco let the sun pour onto him. He had scooped up Harrison’s book from yesterday, paging through it at a good clip. It felt a little like home to sit in the shadows and surreptitiously study Cisco’s working genius. The clever mind behind quick fingers never seemed to stop, ticking on even as other things occupied his attention. Sometimes it was hidden behind quips and deferment, but Harrison never lost sight of it. It had been Cisco’s mind that he loved first and watching it move through schemes and plans was nearly as arousing as studying his nude form. 

“If you’re doing work, I think I get to splash you with water,” Cisco warned, not looking up. 

“Just reading the news. Nothing particularly interesting.”

“Mmm, you know, I don’t think I’ve read Asimov before,” turning another page, Cisco frowned slightly. “Not sure why.”

“I read all of them when I was young,” Harrison had spent a lot of time holed up in his room alone with a paperback. “The robot ones were my favorites. I hadn’t seen that version before.”

  
“It’s interesting,” Cisco tapped a finger against the spine. The _Positronic Man_ shivered under his attentions. “If you consider a computer complex enough to reason at this level, it would almost have to become intelligent.”

“Ah, but Asimov isn’t considered with raw intelligence, except in the broader meaning,” Harrison rubbed a smear of sunscreen deeper into the exposed skin of his thigh. “It’s about creativity. At what point can a mind leave behind the strict lines of logic and create?” 

“Do you think we’re capable of making something like that?” 

“Do you mean us as in humanity in general or us as in you and I?”

“I meant humanity, but now I’m curious if you think you and I could.”

  
Harrison stretched a little, stared up at the too blue sky and it’s sapphire reflection in the water. He thought about morality and microchips, will and willpower. 

“I don’t know that we should,” he answered.

“Yeah,” Cisco flashed him a wry smile. “That’s what I’m thinking too. So many bad movie plots to choose from.”

  
“War Games.”

“2001.”

They talked supercomputer tropes and the morning waved on. Lunch was slices of fresh fruit, cheese and crackers left discreetly at the door. Cisco dripped juice on his skin and dove back into the pool to wash it away.  He emerged and raised an eyebrow, tilting his head towards the outdoor shower.

Harrison shed his clothing and padded after him. The shower was a tile affair, a gentle cool rain of water that was a profound relief to overheated skin. Cisco rested his hands broad on Harrison’s shoulders and kissed him with lazy interest.

“How do you want it?” Harrison asked into his mouth, nipping at Cisco’s lower lip as the question died away.

“On your knees,” Cisco pressed down and Harrison obligingly went.

He liked the weight of Cisco in his mouth, the pleasant texture of the head of his cock resting on the dip of Harrison’s tongue. The shower washed away the threat of chlorine and left no taste at all behind. Cisco kneaded at Harrison’s shoulders and leaned against the tile in an entitled sprawl, letting Harrison take most of his weight.

Harrison didn’t try to draw it out. This was Cisco’s choice and Cisco always asked for speed, even though he really did love to wait. It was if he worried about asking for what he actually wanted, no matter how hard Harrison worked to prove he would give it.  Actually going slow would only undermine Harrison’s attempt to teach him differently. He had to produce what was requested whenever he ceded control to Cisco.

That was one of the reasons he didn’t do it much.  

Cisco’s orgasm shook through them both, a tiny loss of control that took Harrison off-guard. He spat instead of swallowed, wiping away the bitter remains with the back of his hand.

“All right?” He asked.

“I wasn’t concentrating,” Cisco admitted, sliding down the wall to sit on the bottom of the shower. “I think I might’ve gotten a little too relaxed out here.”

“We’re outside. Worst you can do here is shake some tiles loose that can be easily replace,” Harrison kissed the corner of his mouth. “At least I know I can still make you break bathroom fixtures.”

“Ugh,” Cisco groaned, but it trickled into a laugh. “Do you want me to-”

“No. Tonight,” he promised and Cisco shivered beautifully.

“I’m in for it, huh?”

“Only in the way you want to be, gorgeous.”

_“You can call me pet when we do this,” Cisco offered as Harrison knotted the blindfold for the first time._

_“No,” Harrison kissed the nape of Cisco’s neck,. “You’re no one’s pet. I only own you as far as you own me, understood?”_

_“Yeah,” Cisco exhaled in stages. “But it’s nice to have...you know. A difference.”_

_“Gorgeous,” Harrison kissed him again, watching the shiver rise over sensitive skin. “That’s accurate enough.”_

The shower left them both a little tired and as Harrison’s body seemed to accept the heat as an automatic shut down, they took another nap. It was disgustingly decadent and Harrison couldn’t help, but think of the undone work on his desk at the labs, the piles of emails ticking upwards. It occurred to him that he hadn’t taken a real break, an actual honest to god no work, no social events sort of break in years. Not since before Jesse had gone to college the first time.

He woke feeling a little drugged and cotton mouthed. 

“So when’s dinner?” Cisco had the book propped up on Harrison’s back apparently, the sound of a page turning corresponding to slight pressure along his spine.

“I’m not furniture.”

“Could’ve fooled me.”

Harrison rolled over, jostling the book the floor. Cisco watched it go without expression then crawled over Harrison until he blotted out the sun.

“Feed me, Seymour.”

“You’re getting heavier,” Harrison poked him in the side, feeling the muscle there. “Dick’s workout is working.”

“Ugh, I know. Don’t tell him though. Go straight to his head. Anyway, my honeymoon means no crazy diet. I wanna eat something fatty and awesome. And a lot of fish. I bet there’s awesome fish here.” 

“We can walk down to the resort’s restaurant. It’s about a half-mile down the beach.”  

“Great, I guess I should put on something,” Cisco sighed. “Too bad. I’m getting into this nudist lifestyle.” 

“I’ve got something before you do that,” Harrison kissed his cheek and then pushed gently at him. “Into the room, exhibitionist.”

“It’s not exhibitionism if no one can see me, but you,” Cisco stood slowly, making sure Harrison got an eyeful before padding back into the room with Harrison on his heels.

He watched as Harrison dug through his carry on and pulled his prize free.  

“Now,” Harrison turned on his lover and watched in pleasure as Cisco sucked in a breath. “I think you should put this on first.” 

“On is a word for it,” Cisco reached out and touched the silicon. “It’s very...blue.” 

“Mmm,” Harrison had been pleased with the color though it hardly mattered. The plug was slight, tapered and yielding to the touch. Nothing intimidating, just the right size, “you’ll wear it until I’m ready to take you and you’ll still feel the stretch and burn.”

Cisco nodded shallowly, pupils already dilating.  Harrison congratulated himself on a job well done.  With heavy fingers, Cisco took it from him. There was a heavy pause while he contemplated it.  

“Can you?” Cisco asked on an exhalation.

“Yes.”

It was a kind of delicious torture to lubricate the little plug, watch Cisco bend over the bed and go up on his toes in anticipation. Harrison ran a hand down his spine, ticking off each vertebrae with precision. He dribbled extra lubrication onto his fingers, circling familiar territory.

“I used my fingers as measurement,” he said in the stern, low voice that always worked best. Watched the rise of goosebumps over Cisco’s skin. “Same size and near shape as two of them.”

His index finger slid in and twisted a moan out of Cisco. A crook and a second finger without enough warning, a reluctant groaned shoved outwards. The tight channel pushed Harrison’s fingers hard together, the contractions delicious.

“Same size?” Cisco asked in a shudder.

“Same size,” he promised and pulled out careful. Slow. It wouldn’t do for soreness to settle in too early. “Ready?”

The long fall of Cisco’s hair swayed in a yes. Harrison pressed the tip of the plug to his hole and had to pause to swallow at the sight. He should’ve done this months ago, he decided, then slowly slid it home. Watched acceptance and ease take over from resistance as Cisco came down and went flat footed to the floor.

“Can you manage it?” Harrison rubbed his hands back up his to squeeze his shoulders. “It will be at least an hour. Maybe more.”

“Yeah,” Cisco dropped his head onto Harrison’s chest. “Yeah, I can do it.”

“Good,” Harrison gave him a slight slap on the ass, enjoying the jump and swallow. “Clothes, gorgeous.”

“Okay,” Cisco went to his suitcase, opening it for the first time and looking over the contents, momentarily distracted. “Jesse might know too much about me.”

“Oh?”

Cisco pulled out a t-shirt that definitely didn’t belong to him. It was a black v-neck with a white anarchy symbol smeared over the front. Until recently, it had been buried in the back of Harrison’s closet until it became Cisco’s favorite weekend sit around shirt.  

“Save that for tomorrow,” Cisco decided, setting it back in the case. The lean over jostled him enough that he froze momentarily before reaching in to pull out another shirt, this one more his own style, thick and emblazoned with Serenity flying through a sea of fireflies.  The shorts were surprisingly well cut. “These aren’t even mine.”

“Do they fit?”

“You are both weird beyond words with that,” Cisco cinched them closed. “Of course they fucking fit.”

They were perfect. Tighter than Cisco’s usual fare which meant they’d keep everything exactly where Harrison wanted it. He was very proud and slightly nauseous considering how they came to be there, but he was capable of shunting that aside. Wrenching his attention to his own clothes, Harrison focused on getting dressed and finding the room key which had been so casually tossed aside the day before.  

“Ready?” He held out his hand, pleased when Cisco took it.  

The walk started slow as Cisco accommodated himself, but by the time they reached the sand, he had reached some kind of peace with it. He settled into a slightly stilted gait that softened as the water lapped up over their still bare feet.

The restaurant wasn’t much more than a set of tables elevated off the sand set alongside a bar. The waitress smiled at them, waving them into table while she took an order for someone else.  Cisco sat down slowly and the soft hiss crawled right under Harrison’s skin, buzzing there.

“Still good?”

Cisco grinned, wide and wild.

“I need a drink. Big one. With fruit juice.”

“One Bahama Mama, coming up!” The waitress chirped, coming up behind them. Cisco startled and then his eyes went wide. 

“And a whiskey and soda,” Harrison said without skipping a beat. 

The drinks came from a bartender that winked at them as he shook them up. Cisco gave a faint wave of confusion.  The man returning to his shakers was more Harrison’s age than Cisco’s.

“He’s just acknowledging that we belong that brotherhood of gay men.” 

“Bi,” Cisco pointed out. “Both of us.”

“You want to get up and clarify that for him?”

“Noooo,” Cisco leaned into his drink and took a long suck of the straw. “I’m good.”

“I figured.”

The menu relegated Harrison to a hamburger which was at least well-prepared. Cisco gorged himself on fish and fancifully arranged side dishes that were swimming in showers of herbs and spices that scented the air between them.

“I never ever would’ve thought this is where I’d wind up,” Cisco set his fork aside and killed the last of his drink. “I thought at twenty-eight, I would be...I don’t know. Still doing what I was doing at twenty-six, but a little sadder.”

“You would’ve figured something out,” the absolute certainty was wholly unfeigned. “I think...I thought I was rescuing you, but you were on the verge of doing something to save yourself. I got lucky.” 

“I’ll say,” Cisco giggled.

“You cannot be drunk from that one drink.” 

“Just giddy,” was the confirmation. “The walk back’ll be a little easier that way, I think.” 

“Maybe,” Harrison put down cash.  “Up, gorgeous, let’s get you out of the public eye.” 

“Whhhhy?”

“Exhibitionist.”

“Starting to wonder, yeah.”

They staggered a little over the beach on the way back, each jarring step clenching Cisco’s hand harder around Harrison’s bicep.

“How much longer?” He asked when their deck came into view.

“As long as I want,” Harrison reminded him and the hand on his arm loosened fractionally. Relaxing into it.  

Their bed had been made in their absence, fresh sheets and duvet turned down. Cisco stood still beside it, waiting with shallow breaths.

“You can get naked again,” Harrison allowed and the shorts fell away a little faster than he would’ve liked.   

“You?” Cisco gestured loosely, clearly not surprised to see Harrison shake his head.

“Not yet,” Harrison stayed a few feet away, surveying the landscape. “You know you have to earn that. Go into my carryon. There’s a red vinyl bag. Choose something out of it.”

Cisco knelt down with care, eyes nearly closing for a moment, but otherwise repressing any reaction to the plug shifting inside him. It was amazing how quickly he could be made to adjust. The dawn of surprise as he went through what Harrison had bought was entertainment of itself.

Pain wasn’t their drug of choice, for the most part. There were silken ropes though, soft and supple, the blindfold, a hair brush, and something entirely new. Cisco took out the little case and opened it, staring blankly inside.

“What is it?”

“A sound,” Harrison twitched a smile. “You inferred that you didn’t have any virginity left. I’m inclined to disagree. Don’t touch it. I sterilized it before we left.”

That rapid fire brain went to work and Cisco looked up in startled interest.

“Won’t it hurt?”

“It’s a beginner’s. Flexible and thin,” Harrison shrugged. “But it might.”

Cisco ran a finger around the edge of the case considering. He bit his lip and Harrison reached down to take the case from him, zippering it closed.

“Not tonight then.”

“But-”

“I said no,” Harrison said firmly and noted the war of relief and regret. “We’re here for a week, gorgeous. Not everything has to happen at once. Now choose something.”

Cisco reached unerringly for the rope, holding it upward in supplication.

“Good choice. On the bed. Face down.”

The mattress dipped in an instant, Cisco resting his head on crossed arms. Harrison ran his hands up firm legs and parted the globes of his ass. The base of the plug still flared outward, settled where he’d left it. Playfully, he twisted the plug just a centimeter to left.

“Oh, fuck,” Cisco bit at his own arm.

“Dry?”

“Little bit.”

Harrison got a towel from the bathroom. Urging Cisco up onto his elbows and knees, he took a teasing second to run a hand over Cisco’s stirring cock. It jumped in his hand as if it too was straining toward him.

“Easy,”  laying the towel out, he eased Cisco back down. Then he poured a generous amount of lubrication on the base of the plug. With the new slick gathering, he eased the plug out a careful inch to gather it up, then slid it back home. 

The punched out breath set him grinning and he worked the little plug in and out until it slide home with ease once more.  Then he gave it a series of quick, angled taps. 

“Nononono,” Cisco’s hands scrambled over the covers, trying to find purchase.

“None of that,” Harrison seized Cisco’s wrists, brought them to the small of his back. Practice played the rope out easily, binding wrist to wrist, forearm to forearm in whisper soft blue silk. Cisco tested out the knots, tensing and relaxing over and over until he gave into their thrall. “Good, very good. On your knees.” 

It took a hard heave to leverage himself up, but Cisco always managed. He was perfect, chest heaving, hair wild and his cock sticking straight up from between his thighs. He could stay like that for an hour if Harrison asked him too. Longer, probably. Harrison reached out to rub his thumb over his lower lip, dipping his thumb inside for Cisco to suck.

“What should I do with you?” He mused as if he didn’t have a plan. His free hand traced circles over Cisco’s stomach, arched upward to flow over his chest. When he reached one pert brown nipple, he pinched it hard between his fingers.

“Ah!” Cisco tilted his chest away.

“No, gorgeous, back to me,” he coaxed. “Take it and I’ll strip for you.”

The next pinch was harder, but Cisco withstood it, biting gently on Harrison’s thumb. When Harrison drew it away, he protested wordlessly, then had to swallow a strangled scream as Harrison went for both nipples at once. But he didn’t shy away.

“Perfect,” Harrison praised and Cisco smiled, slow and steady, eyes dropped to Harrison’s belt buckle. “Yes, yes, deal is a deal.”

He stood and undid his belt, letting it coil like a snake at the end of the bed. The idea of using it on Cisco was abhorrent to him, but teasing him with the possibility was the kind of thing their relationship thrived on. There was no art to his clothing removal, but Cisco watched with clear appreciation anyway. 

“You should always stand in moonlight,” Cisco said dreamily.

“I shouldn’t have let you have that drink,” Harrison deemed. He sank a hand into Cisco’s dark mane, pulling hard enough to tip his head back. “I’m going to touch you. But the moment you feel yourself starting to come, you tell me. Understood?”

“Yes.”

“If you come without permission, you’re sleeping with that plug in.”

“Yes,” Cisco said again with a hint of panic that Harrison appreciated.

“Good.”

Harrison kept him kneeling, sitting down beside him with utter casualness, heedless of his own nudity. He reached for Cisco’s erection, wrapping his fingers firmly around it. The excess lubrication was still on his hands and made for a slick channel that Cisco couldn’t help, but try to thrust into. Harrison tightened his grip in warning. 

“Still.”

Cisco went still as stone, his breathing already turning irregular.  

The next few minutes were utter perfection. Harrison stroked slowly up and down the swollen shaft, teasing a finger at the sensitive nerves at the base of the head. Every shudder and attempt to calm himself, only led to Cisco clamping down on the plug and sending further waves of pleasure over his jangled nerves.  Harrison got to watch all of it.

“Gonna,” Cisco gasped out and Harrison pulled away, leaving Cisco to thrust at empty air. “Oh...please." 

“Do you want to come,” Harrison reached behind him, slid a hand under the plug so the base was cupped in his hand. “Do you want me to take this out and fuck you until you can’t hold back anymore? Hm?”

“Yes, please, fuck,” Cisco whimpered. “I want you. Please...”

Harrison nipped at Cisco’s shoulder and shoved his palm flat, jarring the plug inside of him. Tears sprang to Cisco’s eyes.

“Good,” Harrison licked a line over the bite, tasting a boozy tone to the sweat. “I think we’ve almost got all of that drink out of you now.”

“Shit,” Cisco closed his eyes, hands flexing again against the rope. “Please...I don’t want to hold it off.”

“Yes, you do. Now get on the floor,” It took some doing, but Cisco managed to get off the bed and sink to his knees. By the time he got down there, he sweating hard and definitely shaking. Spreading his legs, Harrison bracketed him in, confining him with another layer of safety and grounding. “Do what you do best.”

With sigh, Cisco bent his mouth to Harrison’s erection and licked from root to tip. He gave a masterful performance of a blowjob, his eyes never leaving Harrison’s face as he worked, cheeks hollow and lips turning ruby red.

“Stop,” Harrison ordered, when he sensed his own pleasure taking a turn for the final. Pulling off with an obscene sound, Cisco kept his gaze trained upwards. “You are disgustingly beautiful like this. It’s....artwork.”

Only through long practice did those eyes stay on Harrison. It had taken weeks to train Cisco to take a compliment without making a comment or deflecting, longer still to make it stick in the bedroom. Now, he could at least take it and internalize it somehow in that vast catalog.

“Are you ready for me?”

Cisco nodded so violently that Harrison had to laugh. It broke some of the mood, but that was all right. They were careening toward the end now. At Harrison’s urging, Cisco got to his feet, swaying a little as he stood. 

“I’m going to switch the ropes, don’t you dare try to move. Understood?”

“Yes,” Cisco waited still as he could manage as Harrison undid the knots. When he shifted his wait slightly, Harrison gave his ass a firm slap. “Fuck!”

“Getting sensitive?”

“I have never been more aware of every single nerve in there,” Cisco swallowed hard. 

“Now think about how it’s going to feel when I push inside.”

That thought seemed to stymie him enough that Cisco didn’t move against as the rope rejoined over his wrists, this time in front of him.

“On your back,” Harrison pushed at him a little to get him going. “Focus a little longer, gorgeous.”

His hair fanned out over the pillow, his arms tied flat to his torso and his legs splayed wide, Cisco somehow looked both vulnerable and strong. He could get out of the ropes in a second with a casual vibration. He could spread Harrison’s atoms to the wind and walk out without leaving a trace behind.  He was the most powerful person that Harrison had ever met and he submitted out of a sheer desire to do so.

“I love you,” Harrison kissed him and Cisco kissed him back with abandon.

“Love you too,” Cisco sighed when their lips parted. Harrison reached down between them and slid the plug out and away, tossing it in the direction of the bathroom. Without pause, he pushed two fingers in to replace them.  “Might be the same size, but they feel totally different.”

“How so?” Harrison asked, spreading his fingers slowly apart to finish the job the plug had had taken nearly to the end.

“Better,” Cisco said firmly. “Way better. Not as good as your cock though.”

“Trying to earn it?”

“I haven’t already?”

“Maybe,” Harrison pulled the second rope from where he’d nested it.

Securing Cisco’s arms to his thighs, left him spread out like a banquet. Harrison shifted down the bed and applied his tongue to the heated flesh of Cisco’s entrance.

“Oh, fuckfuckfuck,” Cisco thrashed, too firmly trussed to get more than an inch or two in any direction. “Please, Harrison. I can’t... you feel...please...”

Harrison thrust his tongue in and relished the litany of praise and swearing that rained down on him. Eventually, his own body could take no more and he had to pull away. He set his hands on Cisco’s ass, then grabbed a pillow from the head of the bed and shoving it under roiling hips.

“Be still,” he ordered again and it was not so easily followed this time. Cisco had to suck in several deep breaths before he found some kind of center. The bedsheets blurred a little, tiny quakes of vibration. Harrison waited until all had gone quiet.

“Now?” Cisco begged, his voice shot to rags.

“Now,” Harrison agreed and pressed inside.

There was no chance of finesse at the end, all of his control having gone to the rest of the efforts. Cisco threw back his head in ecstatic relief and Harrison could grab hold and pound into the beloved body.  The bed shook with the force of their efforts and a pillow exploded as Cisco came hard, stripping ropes, wrists and belly with his come. Harrison came with terrifying strength, clinging to a shred of himself to keep from making a godawful noise. Then he gently collapsed beside Cisco, watching shards of cotton float to rest over them.

“Little help?” Cisco asked after a wavering moment. Harrison reached over and tugged at a single exposed end which loosened the ropes enough for Cisco to wiggle free. When the last of them had been cast aside, Harrison drew him in close.

On queue, Cisco started to shiver despite the heat. The aftereffects of bondage always visited on him that way. Fumbling under them, Harrison somehow managed to get them both under the covers as Cisco’s teeth chattered. 

“It’s okay,” Harrison soothed, hands stroking over hair and shoulders and back. “You’re okay. You did so well.”

“So did you,” Cisco said with something like a laugh as he thrust one thigh between Harrison’s legs and pressed their foreheads together.


	9. The Honeymoon, Part two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A deep discussion, a dance, sex, sounding and a revelation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Forgot to mention in part one that this is for GreenSorceress, who encourages the sexy times.

The exertion of the night before reset their patterns and Harrison woke far before Cisco. He left the bed and without the woods to give him succor, went down to the beach. The waves rolled in with pleasant ease, sucking the sand out from under his feet as he walked. It wasn’t the same, but it would do. 

The restaurant had been switched over to a breakfast buffet, so he pieced together a protein heavy meal. Cisco would need the calories. Coffee in hand, he made his way back with the rising sun. Another family appeared, small children running amok and shrieking with laughter as they ducked in and out of the waves. The parents looked worn out, but happy, the father chasing the older boy into the water and swooping him onto his shoulders. 

Cisco was still sleeping, head practically buried beneath one of the intact pillows when Harrison set the bounty out on the table. So he rescued his book, found the fold Cisco had made and set about catching up to the tissue Cisco was using as a bookmark. He was a few pages from surpassing it when a hand slid into his hair. 

“Coffee,” Cisco said happily. “You made coffee appear.” 

“Magic,” Harrison agreed, pleased when Cisco set aside the mug long enough to drape himself over Harrison’s lap, eyes quick scanning the book. 

“Okay, you can turn the page.” 

“Demanding.” 

It was strange to read along with someone, adjusting his own pace to Cisco’s only fractionally slower one. The book did have the stretched feeling of a novella shaped into a novel, but the things Harrison had once enjoyed were still present. It wasn’t until they were nearing the end that he became aware of the rising heat and saw the first threatening pink on his skin. His arm was settled beside Cisco and he couldn’t help, but envy how the already darker skin had only turned a more perfect gold under the sun’s attention. 

“You’ve got an appointment,” Harry recalled. 

“What?” Cisco shook his head as if tossing off the the threads of the story. 

“Massage at the spa,” Harrison explained. “Thought you might enjoy one after last night.” 

“Funny, you usually just bully me out of bed and make me go to work.” 

“Fair enough,” Harrison tilted his head back to take in Cisco’s expression. Joking. Mostly. “But we don’t have anywhere to be. And I think you’d like it.” 

“Just me?” 

“Strangers. Touching me,” Harrison shook his head. “No.” 

“Of course,” Cisco laughed. “Should’ve pieced that together myself. Okay. When?” 

“We have time to go down to the water first. Maybe lunch, if you’re hungry enough.” 

It turned out Cisco wasn’t much of a swimmer, but he didn’t seem to mind standing in the warm waves while Harrison left the shore behind. It had been a long time since he’d had the wide ocean to tackle. There was a pool at the gym in the Labs that he still took advantage of on occasion, enough to keep him equal to the waves. 

It was unwise to exhaust himself, but there was something so simple and challenging about fighting against the oncoming water that he nearly did. When he finally drifted back to shore, aching and exhausted, he found Cisco kneeling in the sand idly building some kind of structure. 

“Castle?” he grabbed a towel from the hastily thrown together bag they’d brought from the room. 

“Fortress,” Cisco corrected and shored up one wall with moistened sand. “It used to drive Dante crazy when we were young enough to go to playgrounds.” 

“What did?” 

“I only wanted to stay in the sandbox. If there were other kids to play with, he didn’t care. But if there weren’t...he wanted me to play with him. Probably the only time that he did. But he didn’t care about buildings, he wanted to be pirates or spacemen. It’s funny, I used to think it was his fault that we weren’t close. But maybe it was mine a little too. I never did get out of the sand.” 

“You’re just different,” Harrison tugged lightly on Cisco’s loose ponytail. “And you’re making up for it now.” 

“Yeah,” sand drifted from between Cisco’s fingers, carried back out into the water. “I guess we are.” 

“Lunch?” 

“I could eat.” 

It was more subdue in the light of day without lust clouding their pathway, but their hands still tangled together and the world still felt a little softer, kinder, in the absence of other stimuli. The bartender from the night before was back and he beamed at them as they approached the bar. 

“We have a hundred different rums, you know,” he read them the company line and Cisco fed into it, asking questions and sampling tiny plastic glasses as Harrison picked his way through a chicken salad. Cisco ate whatever he left behind, on top of his own sandwich. 

“Don’t forget,” Stephen, the bartender had emphasized the ‘ph’ over ‘f’, said, “dancing tonight.” 

“Sounds good,” Cisco winked at Harrison, who rolled his eyes. “We’ll be there.” 

The spa was in another cluster of buildings close by. Harrison walked Cisco there, watching him turn on the charm on the receptionist. She smiled at him kindly and offered up a bathrobe. Confident that he was in good hands, Harrison reapplied his sunscreen and returned to the room. 

He hadn’t meant to fall asleep, but with nothing else to gnaw at, apparently his brain was more willing to idle. He woke when Cisco tapped gently on his face with hand that reeked of sandalwood. 

“They turned me into a puddle of ooze,” he said with great satisfaction, bouncing a little as he sat down on the bed. “It was amazing.” 

“Mmmm,” Harrison yawned. “That’s nice.” 

“I’d think you were getting sick, if I didn’t know better,” Cisco teased. “You’d think you were the one put through the paces last night.” 

“I exerted effort,” he grumbled. 

“I think the ocean, not me, wore you out,” Cisco stretched out beside him. “There’s a movie on channel four.” 

Harrison had no idea what the damn thing was about or why anyone was doing what they were doing, but as usual, Cisco was entertainment enough while being entertained. When the credits rolled and Cisco got in his last crack, Harrison started contemplating a real shower beyond a quick rinse outside to get the salt off his skin. 

“Why did you stop last night?” Cisco asked into the silence left behind. 

“What?” It took Harrison entire seconds to piece together what he was talking about, an unforgivable lag. “Cisco. You know why.” 

“I don’t. I would’ve done it,” his eyes flicked to the red bag still standing stark among Harrison’s neatly folded clothes. “You now I would’ve. Could.” 

“You’ll do nearly anything when you’re like that,” Harrison sat up, scrubbing his hands over his face and hair. “Starting something new and heavy needs a conversation when you’re not under the influence.” 

“You’ve never let that stop you before,” Cisco said thickly. 

Harrison stared at him, feeling the blow as palpable as a slap. 

“That’s not true,” he got out. “Why do you think I make suggestions hours before we do something? Tell you what I’m planning? I would never ever knowingly force you to do something that made you truly uncomfortable. You know that, right?” 

“I-” Cisco started then stopped, biting at his lip. “I don’t know what will make me uncomfortable though. Everything you do when I’m like that feels....right. Like I’m just made to take whatever you’ll throw at me. It’s only later that it starts to seem weird.” 

“How much later?” Harrison pressed, going over every new thing he’d introduced to Cisco in the last year, trying to find the places where he might have failed him. 

“The next day, usually. Whenever we’re apart. It creeps in.” 

“What does?” 

“This feeling that I’m...I don’t know. That I’m depraved, I guess. I’m not ashamed or anything. But it’s...” Cisco rubbed the heel of his hand against his chest. “It’s just a passing thing. That’s not even what we were talking about-” 

“I’m sorry,” Harrison didn’t reach out as much as he wanted to. Touch would only confuse the matter, he realized. “Maybe you were right all those months ago. We should’ve talked it over more thoroughly.” 

“Harrison,” Cisco said roughly. “That’s not- it’s not you failing me. It’s just mine own jerkbrain taking punches.” 

“You come to me when you feel that way,” Harrison insisted, refusing eye contact. “You do not let yourself feel badly for who you are. It’s...it’s the most beautiful thing in my life. That you let me take care of you. If I had known that I was hurting you-” 

“You aren’t,” Cisco took his hand with both of his. “Don’t be...no. Just no. Jerkbrain. And I’ll let you talk me down next time it happens. This isn’t what I wanted to talk to about. I was asking about last night because I kept thinking that you thought it was too far or something and it wasn’t.” 

“It would’ve been,” Harrison licked his lips. “You trust me with you, so trust me when I set a limit. You were blown last night.” 

“Maybe,” Cisco allowed. “Maybe next time we should actually talk about it rather than you domming me into brainlessness, okay?” 

“Okay,” Harrison let out a shaky breath. “I’m not even entirely sure what I’m agreeing or disagreeing with at this point.” 

“Welcome to my side of the game,” the rueful smile cut at him. “The uncertainty is sort of half the fun though.” 

“Come here,” Harrison coaxed him closer, buried his face in the black silk of Cisco’s hair. Cisco clamored close, straddling Harrison’s waist. 

_Don’t let me hurt you,_ Harrison wanted to beg. But the words stayed stuck in the morass of his chest. Besides, Cisco didn’t need to be told, not really. He was stronger than he looked, stronger than he believed. 

And Jesse would kill them both if they messed up badly enough, so there was that safeguard. 

“Ugh,” Cisco rubbed his cheek against Harrison’s then sat back on his heels. “Drama makes me hungry.” 

The bartender greeted them with a knowing wave into two-top that had a ‘Reserved’ tent on it. It was far busier than it had been the night before, a DJ set up in the beach and plywood laid out over the sand. Cisco eyed the rude design with something like professional critique. 

“How would you do it?” Harrison asked out of sheer curiosity. 

“Trifold, if space as an issue. Plywood is terrible for warping...need something stiffer, but with give for the sand. Plastic, maybe. Quarter inch thick,” Cisco pursed his lips, “Hinges would be a problem, grains getting into them.” 

Harrison listened, then watched as Cisco borrowed a pencil from the waitress and sketched out a brilliantly simple mechanism. It wasn’t patentable or even practical, but Harrison made sure to fold the napkin into his pocket when their food came. 

The music started, drowning out conversation and catching up Cisco’s attention. The usual assortment of vacationeers were gathering on the wood, eyeing up the resort’s employee: a decent looking man with tousle of blond curls and sharp blue eyes. He kept flicking a glance over at the bartender, who mixed drinks oblivious to the attention. 

A mike manifested in the man’s hand and he smiled out at the crowd, 

“Good evening, ladies and gentleman. I’m Mark and my lovely lady spinning the tunes is Fig. Are you ready to dance?” 

A ragged cheer went up and something pretending to be salsa started to play. The DJ looked heartily sick of it already. A few couples were making a go of it, but for the most part it was women with their husbands watching idly from the bar. Mark’s job became clear as he moved from woman to the next, twirling and flirting without a single objectionable touch. They looked heated and happy in his wake, turning to each other to keep the high going. 

“He’s good,” Cisco said over the music, gaze narrowing. 

“You’re better?” Harrison lifted his eyebrows. 

“We’ll see,” Cisco finished his drink and was on the floor. 

Relegated to hanging at the bar with the other husbands, Harrison carefully choose a stool far enough away not to be drawn into conversation. Cisco spun in among the couples and picked up the saddest looking the singles with a boyish grin and a blush. A look that Harrison would’ve still fallen for knowing damn well it was a lie.

The wives weren’t Cisco’s intent though and it was a joy to watch Mark’s discovery of a rival. They circled each other, moving between women as the songs slid closer to something like real music. Eventually most of the husbands fled to either collect or join their wives before Mark or Cisco could do real, if unintentional damage. 

A tango started and with a provocative smile, Mark held a hand out to Cisco. A beat of consideration and Cisco took it. It was an interesting war of movement, Mark clearly putting on a slather of seduction which refused to stick to Cisco. 

“If I had a man like that, I wouldn’t let him dance with a man like Mark,” Stephen was Harrison’s elbow, a shot of dark rum on ice held aloft. 

“Oh?” Harrison took the drink and threw it back. “That man is impervious to flirtation. It’s a super power.” 

“Maybe, maybe not,” Stephen winked. “But it can never hurt to make sure, can it?” 

“You should take your own advice. Mark’s been checking to make sure you’re watching him every fifteen minutes,” Harrison frowned. “It’s a bit...sad, actually.” 

“He has not,” Stephen pinked and Harrison slipped away. Good deed for the day solidly done. 

The tango was winding into a power ballad meant for the kind of dance that didn’t leave room for the Holy Ghost. Harrison slid his hand down Cisco’s elbow. 

“Hi!” Cisco grinned wide and guileless at him, dropping out of the dance without a backward glance. Mark looked more than a little put out. Being the bigger man, Harrison schooled his face into a neutral expression. Not his fault that he had what Cisco termed ‘terminal resting bitch face’. 

“Hi,” Harrison dropped a kiss on his lips. “Can I get this dance?”

“You don’t dance,” Cisco pointed out. “I mean, you’ve tried. It’s...cute. But no.” 

“I can sway,” Harrison slid his hands down to Cisco’s waist. “Anyone can sway.” 

So they swayed and everything smelled like rum and sea salt. Mark was apparently off duty and he made beeline for the bar. Harrison watched over Cisco’s shoulder as Stephen handed him a tall ice filled glass under flirtatious eyelashes. 

“You look..pleased,” Cisco said suspiciously and Harrison turned his attention to him. 

“Social engineering. Not generally my specialty.” He indicated the bar with his chin. Cisco looked back, took in the scene and laughed. 

“Caught that, did you? Nice. I was working the jealousy angle.” 

“We should have coordinated,” Cisco grinned. “Or maybe we did.” 

The song filtered out and so did they. Halfway back, Cisco tapped a rhythm out on the back of Harrison’s hand. 

“Yes?” 

“Can we? Tonight? I can’t stop thinking about it now. No...scene or anything. Just that.” 

“I can manage that.” 

“I keep thinking about the whole virginity thing,” Cisco laughed at himself, kicking a wave of sand upward. “It’s stupid. Mostly made up misogynistic bullshit, but....” 

“Romantic bullshit. Which you like,” Harrison said lightly. 

“Shut up. Yes.” 

“There’s a white t-shirt you can wear.” 

“Fuuuuck you,” Cisco sing-songed. 

There was preparation, nothing Cisco would probably find sexy, so Harrison sat him down with a glass of cranberry juice and an order to choke it down if it took watering it down with vodka. When everything was as clean as it was likely to be, he drew Cisco into the shower. There were still hints of massage oil clinging to his skin and Harrison took pleasure in sluicing it away. 

“Where?” Cisco asked once as he dripped onto the tile. 

“The bed, I think. Should be more comfortable.” 

After some shuffling, they settled with Harrison against the headboard and Cisco settled between his legs, leaning fully on him. It was an awkward angle for a kiss, but they managed. Harrison stroked Cisco’s chest, then in lingering circles around the stomach. 

The latex gloves were black which provoked a laugh from Cisco that Harrison felt was well earned, considering how long ago he’d planned it. 

“Well, at least they don’t make me think of getting a physical,” he watched Harrison draw out the sound. “I’m not exactly up and at ‘em.” 

“Better if you’re not.” 

It was intimate and sensual, if not their usual intense heat. Harrison kept his mouth at Cisco’s ear, talking him through, 

“This is thin, small,” he smoothed lubricant over the head of Cisco’s cock, “I’ll go slow.” 

“It really is a first time,” Cisco dropped his head against Harrison’s shoulder, but his gaze was locked downward. 

“We stop the second you want,” Harrison reminded him. “The microsecond.” 

“Picosecond?” 

“If I can react fast enough, yes.” 

“Okay,” Cisco sucked in a breath and let it out slowly. 

Harrison kissed his shoulder, the side of his neck and nipped at his earlobe. Distracted him as he made sure the sound was soaking in lubrication. Gently, he cupped Cisco’s penis and let the sound kiss the tiny hole. There was no coaxing or shoving, only letting gravity take it’s natural course. It sank in only a few millimeters. 

“Oh,” Cisco reached on arm up lacing it behind Harrison’s neck. “That feels...deeply strange.” 

“Bad?” 

“No?” He closed his eyes, accessing. “No. More?” 

The sound took it’s time, sliding inside the shaft. It was hypnotizing to watch, the way Cisco always found a way to welcome whatever was thrown at him. The sound sank another fraction of inch and Cisco groaned. 

“Good or bad?” 

“Feels like...dunno, like I’m gonna come which is so fucking weird cause there’s no damn lead up,” Cisco squirmed a little. “Can I even come with this thing in?” 

“Yes.” 

“That’s...are you speaking from experience?” 

“Cisco,” Harrison kissed him again, careful not jar anything below the waist. “Do think I would ever try something on you that I hadn’t tried on myself first?” 

“Now that...” Cisco sucked in a breath. “That’s an image. Did you like it?” 

“I have a full set at home,” he watched the flush of interest spread across Cisco’s face. “I’ll show you.” 

“That is awesome.” 

With slow stimulation, Cisco proved he could hold an erection with the sound in though it ripped new, unusual sounds out of him. 

“I can’t...huh...” he huffed, “not sure how I can get passed it.” 

“What if I...” Harrison pulled the sound out minutely, then let it slide back in. Cisco’s hands clawed into his thighs. 

“Do that again,” he demanded. 

Over long, syrup slow minutes, Harrison used the sound to penetrate Cisco’s cock and watched him fall into quivering pieces. The orgasm took them both by surprise and Harrison withdrew the plug, perhaps a little too quickly by Cisco’s strangled cry. 

“Did that hurt?” Harrison asked, sharp and quick. 

“No,” Cisco panted. “I think I...I think I came twice, holy shit.” 

“Ah,” Harrison relaxed back against the pillows and let the sound roll back into it’s case. 

Cisco turned, hunched on all fours over Harrison’s prone body. 

“You are...” he shook his head, “okay. Marrying you was officially a good decision.” 

“I should damn well hope so,” Harrison tilted his face up and Cisco kissed him with obliging fervor. “Do you think you can get it up again?” 

“Yeah, in a bit, why?” 

“It’s been awhile since I was on the bottom.” 

They fucked feverishly once Cisco had recovered. It was always different when Harrison bottomed with Cisco returning to something like hesitance for the first half and then taking over like a man possessed once he’d figured out that Harrison wasn’t going to throw him off for trying. Pressed belly flat to the bed, Harrison had to do little, but take it as Cisco spread above him. 

Cisco always laced their hands together as if without Harrison offering restraint, he had to create it on his own. For the first time since putting it on, Harrison was deeply aware of the circle of gold around his finger. Cisco’s rings locked against it as they coupled, ringing out the quietest of bells. 

Maybe there was something to firsts. Maybe it was just the heat of the moment. But far more than he had in the Justice’s office, Harrison felt utterly married to the man pressing him to the mattress. 

This was his life now. Confusion and sex and napkin blueprints and Jesse’s input and negotiations and telenovelas and decadence that gave way to the mundane and metahumans and books about androids. There would be no more quiet days with only his own thoughts to keep him company.

He had a partner again, real and vivid and biting. 

Harrison drew their joined hands to his lips and kissed the place their fingers overlapped. Cisco thrust harder, making him see stars and the world collapsed back down into bodily needs. They stayed locked together afterwards, Cisco blanketing him. 

“I love you,” Harrison told him. Because he had promised. Because he did. 

Because that was who he was now. The person that Cisco had made.


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A bit more of Penumbra and Vibe with the sudden appearance of another Cisco in their shared dream.

The knack of Knocking between worlds in dreams could not be accurately described with only English, Spanish and ASL to work with. Cisco had tried for Harrison’s sake, but could not quantify it in any way that pleased them both. 

“It’s like taking reality and gently twisting it to the left,” he’d eventually settled on when nothing else suited. 

“Hmm,” Harrison propped his chin in his hand, studying him over the dinner table. It was a dissecting look. A look that said ‘no matter how beloved you are to me, some tiny itchy little part of me would like to open up your skull and poke around a bit’. 

Cisco didn’t mind the look. He only knew it from seeing it the mirror anyway. 

Then there was the discussion of sexual fidelity in what was essentially a dream. 

“But it involves a real person,” Cisco had argued. 

“If I start getting jealous of figments, regardless of their actual physical counterparts, then our relationship will disintegrate under the intensity of my paranoia,” Harrison soldered two wires together, then held them up for inspection. 

“Looks good, you’re getting better,” Cisco frowned at the careful work, the joins of two wires. “But you know him. You’ve met him.” 

“And I feel about as threatened by him as I do a fly drowning in my soup.” 

So that was their agreement. Cisco was allowed his forays into dreams and Harrison stringely never asked for details. It worked for them. 

In dreams, he was always Penumbra. Not only in name for confusion’s sake, but in dress. Although the headphones hung around his neck, he somehow always dreamed himself into the black on black of his suit. He had more practice with their abilities and it showed. The landscape generally bent to his desires, becoming the vegetable garden in front of his house or the milky green tiled kitchen. 

Tonight, it was the former. The garden at dusk smelled of good earth releasing the heat of the day. Vibe sat among the cabbages, legs folded up under him. He wore something bordering on fashionable, bright red denim, bright graphic t-shirt and a loose plaid shirt folded over it all. His hair was still not nearly as long as Penumbra’s though it seemed he might be making an attempt. 

“Hey,” he said, making no move to rise to his feet. 

“Hey,” Penumbra folded himself down, resting on his knees beside him. “You’re getting better at Knocking.” 

“Practice has to sink in eventually,” the bitterness was real, but mild. 

“So what’s up?” He saw the shadow of a weed and reached down to pluck it. It was a pointless thing to do, but it was his garden regardless of form and it annoyed him to see it in disarray. “Metahuman problem?” 

“Not this week, but we’re due,” Vibe shrugged. “It’s been quiet, actually. Barry is seeing someone new and Caitlin is working on this complicated paper on bioethics that has a deadline of ten minutes ago. No random visitors lately.” 

“So you’re lonely.” 

“Yeah,” Vibe gave him a self-effacing smile. “Guess so. Everything is so frantic usually that I don’t have time to notice.” 

“I always imagined you had something like a social life,” Penumbra considered the cabbages, still in their stunted early growth. 

“You mean like yours?” 

“I spend most of my time with my husband and his kid,” he shrugged. “It’s not exactly a life of the party sort of gig.” 

“At least you’ve got him though,” Vibe sighed. “It seems like everytime I find someone, they slip through my fingers. Past life lovers or interfering families or you know. They’re straight up evil.” 

“You do have a certain villain catnip thing going on,” Penumbra elbowed him gently. “Maybe you should think about looking less stealable.” 

“I’ll get right on removing all my extra diamonds and gold plating.” 

The evening poured orange and pink light over the garden. Penumbra shed his jacket, exposing his arms to the cooling air. He slid an arm around Vibe’s shoulders, pulling him close. They watched the sunset. 

“I don’t mean to use you,” Vibe muttered. “But you just keep being there at the right moment.” 

“Hero skill,” he laughed and squeezed Vibe gently. “Anyway, it’s not like I don’t get anything out of our time together.” 

“You have a weird outdoor thing, by the way.” 

“I’ve recently become acquainted with a certain exhibitionist streak,” he allowed, then taking that as an opening into the next phase, tugged at Vibe’s shirt. 

Nudity was easily achieved and the ground gave soft as a bed beneath them. On principal, Penumbra moved them away from the garden and onto an impossibly soft and dry patch of grass. It was different being with Vibe. He was so much softer than Harrison, in every conceivable way. The edge of domination that he’d come to desire almost as much as the sex itself was simply not in Vibe’s sexual vocabulary. 

Instead, they spent a lot of their time together exchanging kisses and stroking hands very steadily and slowly over each other. Vibe liked the intimacy of face to face, the give and take of their mirror image. Penumbra never bit or clawed him, learned to turn a grab into caress. It wasn’t his favorite way of getting off and he never had the intensity of orgasm that he had with Harrison, but there was something enormously satisfying with how Vibe would cling to him and whisper the kinds of things that would never come out of Harrison’s mouth like ‘baby’ and ‘sweetheart’. 

“It’s okay, I’ve got you,” Penumbra would say back, speaking right into Vibe’s mouth. “I have you.” 

And certainly he had never seen someone shatter so wonderfully well, coming in a wave of closing eyes, loosened lips and rising moan. It was nothing like his own orgasms and he wasn’t sure how the universe accounted for those differences, but there they were. 

Afterwards, they lay side by side, Penumbra on his back looking up at the stars and Vibe on his stomach pretending not to look at Penumbra. There was no sweat or mess. It was nice, but added to the faint unrealness of it, the detachment of consequences and meaning. 

“There was something,” Vibe said eventually. 

“What’s that?” 

“I got something like a Knock from one of the other worlds.” 

“One you’ve been to?” 

“Not sure. I don’t think so? We didn’t meet any others of me when we were traveling, but then again we didn’t stay long.” 

“Did you answer?” 

“I wasn’t sure how. It didn’t resonate right. You know what I mean?” 

Penumbra nodded because he did though he couldn’t say how. Vibe fell silent again. Fireflies started to light up around them, flashing their yellow fire in search of a mate. Cicada song creaked through the air. 

“Are you happy?” Vibe asked. 

“Hmm?” Penumbra turned to him, found two dark eyes glittering in the dark and for all they were his eyes, he could read nothing in them. 

“Are you happy? In general, I mean.” 

“Yes,” he said easily. “Why wouldn’t I be?” 

“It was something Eobard said once,” Vibe sighed, “Not to me, really, but to Barry. That he wouldn’t ever be happy and I wonder if that extended out to me and Caitlin too. That somehow what he did just...ruined it all.” 

“You’re usually in good spirits,” Penumbra reached out, ran his hand through Vibe’s hair. “Is that all an act?” 

“No. Not all. Not even most, but I think...I think I don’t know how to just be happy anymore. I’m always waiting for the next disaster or the next knife in the back. It’s like...like I’m this treadmill and every time I think I’ve got a handle on the speed it shifts upward and no matter what I’m not getting anywhere.”  
“I can see how it would feel that way,” he rolled onto his side, running his hand down the plane’s of Vibe’s back. “Some days being Penumbra gets that way. But you...you’re always Vibe now.” 

“I’m never Vibe,” he said and now the bitterness was strong enough to taste in the air. “That’s part of the problem. Vibe stops things from happening. Cisco puts the bandaids on the bleeding wounds with guns and typing. Cisco doesn’t stop problems from happening.” 

“Penumbra isn’t exactly prognosticating,” he said gently. Though it wasn’t quite the truth. He did look into the future sometimes, did get ideas from the those far flung happenings. It wasn’t his strongest skill, but it did get him there before the murder or the rape or the burglary sometimes and it did make a difference. “Anyway, you’re doing plenty. More than most.” 

“It’s not a glory thing. Or maybe it is, a little, but it’s just...I feel like the one thing I can do isn’t good enough. And there isn’t anything else left to prop me up on the bad days.” 

“Have you told anyone else about this?” 

“Who? Everyone else has enough on their plates.” 

What must living with the knowledge of your own death feel like? How do you survive your father figure ripping your heart apart from the inside out? How do you square your shoulders and smile into an unfeeling world day after day while it tries to grind you down underfoot? 

“You should talk to a professional,” that seemed right. A course of action. “Someone who will listen objectively.” 

“And put me on antidepressants?” Vibe sighed. “Yeah, maybe. It’s gotta be worth a try. Not sure what lies I’ll have to make up to make it believable.” 

“You won’t. You tell them that a man you trusted tried to kill you. You tell them that you have a very stressful job with law enforcement. You tell them that your usual support system can’t help you and that your family is...well. They’re useless at best, detrimental at worst.” 

“Ouch,” Vibe tilted a half-smile at him. “Okay, when you put it that way, I’d tell that person to get a therapist.” 

“You’ve had a bit of a few years.” 

“Yeah, I guess so,” he moved slightly to touch the length of his body to Penumbra’s. “But I met you. And your psycho husband. So that’s...something.” 

“He’s not a psycho,” Penumbra said firmly. “He lacks several key distinctive qualities to even be considered sociopathic.” 

“He makes you happy, he could be an octopus for all I care.” 

“You would care a little if I was having tentacle sex,” he teased. 

“Well yeah. I mean, it’s intellectually sexy...probably less so in reality.” 

“I’ll let you know if I ever get the chance to try-” 

A faint tremble made itself known. Not the stiff wave of coming wakefulness, but something more like...

“Is that the Knock you meant,” Penumbra stilled his hands. 

“It feels the same,” Vibe lifted his head, looked around. 

“Only polite to answer,” Penumbra was dressed again in a blink, Vibe shivering back into clothing a hearbeat later. 

Together they threw open the mental door. 

“This is going to be confusing,” Penumbra grimaced. 

A third Cisco Ramon, clad in what looked to be dark brown leather and goggles with lenses oo dark for the time of day, stood ten feet away. He emanated an off frequency hum that gritted against Penumbra’s teeth and into his bones. 

“This I did not expect,” the newcomer cocked his head at the two of them. “Do I have a twin here or what?” 

“He’s not from around here,” Penumbra stood just in front of Vibe. “Something we can do for you?” 

“I’ve been looking through worlds,” the goggles reflected no light, if anything it seemed to absorb them and return nothing. “Trying to raise an army.” 

“What for?” 

“Do you know Zoom?” 

They both nodded tightly, the name a hard hand on their spines. 

“He’s taken over my world. Bent it to his will. I can’t take him down on my own. But if I had more of me...” 

“How many have agreed to come so far?” Penumbra asked. 

“Not enough. Not nearly enough.” 

“I go by Penumbra, and he’s Vibe. Who are you?” 

“Penumbra and Vibe,” he rolled the names through his mouth. “Those are...choices. I’m Reverb.” 

Vibe made a soft scoffing noise behind him and privately, Penumbra rather agreed. 

“Reverb, then, by not nearly enough, do you mean none?”

Reverb said nothing, but he reached up and pulled off his goggles. There was a jagged scar through his left eyelid and the eye below was a milky white. 

“Only one other and he is...not well. His world was mostly radioactive when I reached it and the sickness is catching up with him,” he admitted. “I’ve tried recruiting on my own world, but to stop a speedster, no ordinary metahuman will do.” 

“Harrison Wells,” Penumbra couldn’t quite make it a question. 

“Who?” 

“Find him,” Vibe stepped to Penumbra’s elbow, not quite in front of him. “He’s...he’s a pain in the ass, borderline sociopath, who might actually be a total sociopath from the future named Eobard Thawne, but either way, no form of him wants Zoom in charge. You’ll find him working opposition if he’s still alive.” 

“Harrison Wells,” Reverb repeated. “So neither of you will come?” 

“We have our own worlds to defend,” Penumbra shook his head. “If we start world hopping and saving everyone, we live our own plots unguarded.” 

“Betrayed at every turn by myself,” Reverb stepped backward, back to the seam he had ripped into reality. 

“You can come to mine,” Vibe said more strongly. “If you need a refuge. If you can’t stay. We have provisions in place for world hoppers now. We’ll take care of you.” 

“How kind,” Reverb sneered. “Sanctuary. You would have me leave the place that I guard for a warm blanket and a rationed meal?” 

“Not now,” Vibe glanced at Penumbra, who could only shrug. “But if things don’t work out. You should have a soft place to land. It matters.” 

“Fuck you,” Reverb said gently and then he was gone, striding into the rip in the worlds. 

“Maybe I should’ve-” 

“Don’t,” Penumbra said firmly. “How thin can we stretch before we break? Anyway, he wasn’t exactly giving off a hero aura.” 

“True,” Vibe frowned at the place where Reverb had disappeared. 

“You have a spot for world hoppers now?” He circled back. 

“Oh yeah, we decided after everything that it was a good idea. It’s not much, a bedroom and bathroom setup in the labs. Felicity can help us generate some identification stuff if they’re in for the long term. Enough to get a credit card at least.” 

“That’s kind of you,” it was doable to make something similar. He’d have to to talk to Harrison about it tomorrow. 

“I hope to hell that his Harrison isn’t Eobard,” Vibe murmured. “Can you imagine that team up?” 

Penumbra made a dismissive laughing comment. He’d thought about it, of course. Couldn’t help, but think what damage he could do to the world if he had fallen in love with a speedster instead of an eccentric genius. The world would have belonged to them. Would they have been better than Reverb’s Zoom? 

He had seen the darkness in himself and the flashes of it in Harrison. Were they a little different, a little more hungry, what could they have done? 

“I should go,” Penumbra leaned in to give Vibe a last kiss. “Get yourself someone to talk to. Promise me you will.” 

“I will,” Vibe smiled up at him, for an instant carefree and utterly young. “You give that husband of yours a snide comment from me.” 

“Will do,” he touched the curve of Vibe’s cheek. Softly, softly. “Good night, Vibe. Sweet dreams.” 

The world shimmered and shook and was gone. Penumbra woke to the darkened cave of their bedroom. Beside him, Harrison had turned on his back. He was getting older, the lines of his face threatening to deepen. Cisco curled around him, kissed the wing of his shoulder, took his calloused hand in his own. There was nothing soft about him and that was how Cisco liked it. 

“Stop being sentimental,” Harrison grumbled without opening his eyes. “I can hear it.” 

“Liar,” Cisco laughed. “You haven’t even fallen asleep yet, have you?” 

“You were doing that twitch-moan combination that means you were with him,” Harrison yawned, opened his eyes and rolled to meet him halfway. “I figured I’d wait to see if you woke up after. Everything okay over there?” 

“For a given value,” Cisco allowed. “We met another one. Reverb, he’s called.” 

“Reverb?” Harrison wrinkled his nose. “Lacks a certain something, doesn’t it?” 

“Mm. He had a badass villain thing going. Sort of sexy.” 

“How many of yourself do you have to fuck to feel like you got the whole set?” Harrison kissed the corner of his mouth. 

“I was thinking a baker’s dozen, “he said snidely because he always kept his promises to Vibe. And because it stung a little. 

“I can’t imagine in,” Harrison rubbed an apologetic hand over the point of Cisco’s hip. “Kissing myself is so...dull.” 

“It’s not,” Cisco burrowed closer. “But maybe for you it would be. Myselves are so...other. I don’t think I’d touch Reverb with a ten foot pole then. He looked like the type that might like knives in bed.” 

“Judgmental,” Harrison scoffed, but he did hold Cisco fractionally closer. 

“Do you think I’m happy?” Cisco asked. 

“What do you mean?” 

“I don’t know. Vibe seems sort of depressed and he asked me if I was happy and I said I was and I think I am. So it must be situational, but does that mean I have that brain chemistry that would allow for depression?” 

“Anyone can be depressed,” Harrison corrected. “I think. I don’t know. That sounds like a Jesse question.” 

“Yeah, I think I’ll skip that conversation.” 

“For what it’s worth,” Harrison insinuated himself still closer, a precursor to sex. Cisco was game. The joy of sex in dreams is that it didn’t exhaust the flesh. “You seem happier now than before.” 

“Before what?” 

“Well,” Harrison cleared his throat, “just...before.” 

“Ah, you mean before I met you,” Cisco teased. “My white knight.” 

“Never utter that phrase again,” Harrison said mock sternly, then lowered his face to bite at Cisco’s neck. 

All thoughts of Vibe and Reverb left him. Cisco narrowed his focus to his beloved and let the rest of the worlds be damned.


	11. A Decade or More of You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cisco's 40th Birthday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been a long time and I think I must finally admit that this series has met it's natural end. I will, as always, accept prompts at my tumblr for ficlets. This fractional chapter is something of an epilogue though it is by no means the end of their story.

It had occurred to Harrison, more than once, that the person he’d fallen in love with had been only a little out of boyhood. Certainly Cisco had been mature in many ways, but there were constraints to what twenty-six could be.

Cisco at twenty-six had been gorgeous, unsure and hungry for guidance. Yet, he had resonated against Harrison with such beautiful correctness that Harrison had been willing to forget time and age entirely. There were no regrets, not for Harrison certainly and he suspected not for Cisco either. They had met when they met and there was nothing to be done about that. 

But Cisco at forty... Cisco at forty was perfection, aged to a smooth whiskey finish. He stood straight among a clutch of admirers at the formal Star Labs party in his honor. His suit was of his own choosing, well tailored and far more fashionable than Harrison’s taste. The rise and fall of his voice was calm and even, thoughtful instead of words sloshing against one another. A touch of silver had started to creep in at the temples of his still long hair. 

“I’m going to leave it,” Cisco had told him just that morning. “I like it.” 

“So do I,” Harrison kissed the spot where the grays separated out from their glossy cousins. “Does this mean I can trade in my moniker?” 

“No way,” Cisco smiled at him in the mirror, his eyes crinkling a little more than they used to. “You’re still the original fox.”

Cisco at forty no longer checked over his shoulder to ensure Harrison was near by. He met the world on his own terms. He had young minions of his own buzzing around him even now with their phone screens busy and their eyes wide as they approached. 

“The numbers look fine,” Cisco said indulgently. “Go get a glass of wine, Marissa. You’re going to give us both a headache.” 

“Yes, sir,” she backed away rapidly, nearly colliding with Harrison. “Oh! I’m so sorry.” 

“It’s fine,” he dismissed her with the wave of his hand. But it was too late, Cisco had noticed him. 

“You’re staring,” Cisco left behind the tight circle of well wishers to come to him. 

“You look good,” Harrison shrugged. “And I’ve run out of pleasantness for the night.” 

“Mmhmm,” Cisco leaned into him until Harrison put an arm around his shoulders. “It was your idea to do a public party.” 

“If I didn’t, they would have sprung on you anyway. This way it’s crowd controlled at least.” 

“Thanks for that,” Cisco surveyed the crowd with practiced wariness. There was a hint of Penumbra about him all the time now. It had started slowly and then gained more and more traction. 

Harrison had found himself separating more and more from Penumbra’s life. As his own body started to give off steady reminders of mortality, it had become harder and harder to watch his heart take risks that would scare younger men. He couldn’t help, but resent how Penumbra had become part of their daytime lives as well, robbing Cisco of peaceful moments and easy enjoyment. 

“No one’s out to get us here,” Harrison said gently instead of the thousand and one things he wanted to say. “Or at least not you.” 

“They like you,” Cisco said absently. “More than you think.” 

“So you say.” 

Traffic ebbed and flowed around them, new folks washing up on their shore to give Cisco trinkets and greetings. Efficient hands swept in and took them to the gift table, already piled high with generic greetings from vendors and the like. Eventually, Harrison contrived to slip away and head up to his office. The city glistened beneath his feet, a silent moving picture of lights and cars. It was his city still though he could feel it beginning to slip from his grasp. At sixty-six, he was still sharp and vital, but his energy had begun to wane. The thirst that had always driven him before had been slaked. 

Time had begun to feel a little more precious. A little more like something he should pay conscious attention to, rather than observe after the fact. Jesse was in her late thirties, well established in her private practice and her life. Star Labs had a twenty year vision plan that would see it safely forward. 

What his place was in this vast sprawl of future years was unclear to him. Research, still beloved, had slowed and his ideas were not so fast to come as they used to be. Sometimes, he would find that he had wasted whole hours staring out into the void, lost in some memory instead of the very critical present. 

“Figures,” Cisco barked a laugh and Harrison had to hide his start of surprise. “I don’t know why I thought you’d stay down there.” 

“I can go back if you want,” he offered. 

“Nah,” Cisco stepped up to his side, turning that Penumbra look over the city. “I was looking for you so we could go home.”

“Already?” He glanced at his watch. 

“I don’t want to spend the rest of my birthday with work people,” the shrug was casual, fluid and easy. The smile was rueful. “Besides, I wanted to give you something.” 

“Did you forget how birthdays work?” Harrison reached out to take Cisco’s hand, pleased by the easy way they still wound together. “Has senility set in already?” 

“Oh, age jokes,” Cisco rolled his eyes. “Glass houses and stones, old man. And yes, I know. And I’m sure you got me something that’ll make it impossible for me to get you anything for the next three years without questioning if it’s awesome enough.” 

“I have no idea what you mean.” 

“Liar. I’m looking forward to it. But I did get you something,” he used his free hand to fish an envelope out of his pocket, then handed it to him. 

“This is addressed to the Justice League,” Harrison took it. 

“It’s not sealed yet,” Cisco bit his lip, a signal of nerves that Harrison hadn’t seen in a long time. “Go ahead and read it. I’ll get us a drink.” 

Cisco walked over the the small wet bar while Harrison turned the envelope over and slid out a single sheet of paper. He read it over twice. When he heard the clink of ice cubes nearing, he took the drink from Cisco and held it tightly. 

“So?” Cisco asked tightly. “What do you think?” 

“You don’t have to do this,” he re-folded the letter with infinite care, the silver flare of Penumbra’s signature disappearing into a white field. 

“I think I do,” beloved fingers plucked the envelope from him and set it on his desk, Cisco stepped into his personal space. “I’m not saying that I’ll never be involved again. We’ve gotten too many good patents from making things that support them. Sometimes I might even go into the field if it’s something only I can handle, but there’s a lot of us out there now.”

“You love being Penumbra,” Harrison reached up to cup Cisco’s face, the catch of stubble on his palm. 

“I used to,” he tilted his face upward. “But I love the life we’ve built together more. And...I want to go home at the end of a long day. I want to have one name. One life. With you.” 

Harrison could only kiss him in response, words gone from him. A thrill of lust and a deep well of affection spilled over him and he dropped to his knees despite their protests. The soft surprised sound that fell from Cisco’s lips poured over him. 

He sucked him off in front of the window, hands hooked over the back of muscular thighs and one of Cisco’s hands lacing through his hair. When they made it back down to the party, the taste of his husband lingered on Harrison’s tongue. He smiled benignly as Cisco made his goodbyes, a lassitude born of contentment radiating through him. 

Maybe Harrison would stay on a the labs another year or two. Long enough to make sure that Cisco was confident in it. Then he might issue a similar letter and step down. Step away. Concentrate his days on other interests: weed the neglected garden, write the autobiography he’d always meant to pen, or solve the equations that always got pushed aside for more practical work. 

They drove home, their hands joined together. The possibilities spilled out before them and all Harrison really wanted was to take him home and curl around him in their bed. The world could be vast and promising tomorrow in the golden light of day. Tonight, let it be small and intimate and close as heartbeats.


End file.
